Lennart Hardell

Lennart Hardell (born 1944), is a Swedish oncologist and professor at Örebro University Hospital in Örebro, Sweden.[1] He is known for his research into what he says are environmental cancer-causing agents, such as Agent Orange,[2] and has said that cell phones increase the risk of brain tumors.[3]

Lennart Hardell
Alma materUmeå University
Scientific career
FieldsOncology
InstitutionsÖrebro University Hospital
ThesisEpidemiological studies on soft-tissue sarcoma and malignant lymphoma and their relation to phenoxy acid or chlorophenol exposure (1981)

Mobile phone use and cancer

Hardell's research on cell phones and cancer has concluded that long-term mobile phone use is associated with an increased risk of acoustic neuroma and glioma.[4][5] He has said that children should be banned from using cell phones except in emergencies, as he feels the risk of cancer is greater in people who begin using mobile phones before the age of 20.[6]

His early research on wireless phones and cancer was criticized in a 2002 review for methodological flaws. The review authors, John D. Boice Jr. and Joseph K. McLaughlin, wrote that Hardell's study, published in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention, was "non-informative, either because the follow-up was too short and numbers of cancers too small, or because of serious methodological limitations."[7] Another of Hardell's studies, in which he claimed that mobile phone users in rural areas were at a greater risk of developing brain tumors,[8][9] was criticized by Adam Burgess in Spiked. Burgess wrote that the study was "post hoc and therefore hypothesis-generating only," and said that the increased risk Hardell had claimed to have found in the study was "barely statistically significant."[10]

Later studies by the Hardell group have consistently shown increasingly significant risks for brain tumor development associated with wireless phone use . His findings, together with results from the international INTERPHONE study on mobile phones and health, contributed to the verdict by WHO and IARC in 2011, where mobile phone radiation was deemed as "possibly" carcinogenic (group 2B).[11]

Little et al. reported in 2012 that the increased risk of glioma associated with mobile phone use found by a 2011 study by Hardell et al. were not consistent with observed trends in glioma incidence in the United States.[12] Although with regard to the paper of Little et al, data on mobile phone use and cancer incidence rates in the US is more difficult to compare with the aforementioned European studies on mobile phone use and cancer risks than it seems, especially due to differences in technology standards between the US and Europe in early years of mobile phone network technology development – including notable differences in power output between the CDMA standard (which had been widely implemented in the US) and the GSM standard.[13]

Court cases

Hardell testified in a 2002 US court case involving a man who filed a lawsuit claiming that his cell phone caused him to develop a brain tumor. The judge in the case, Catherine C. Blake, dismissed the suit and criticized Hardell's testimony, saying that of the two studies Hardell cited, one found no increased risk of tumors associated with cell phone use. Blake added that the other study was criticized as flawed by experts, and said that numerous studies and governmental bodies had come to conclusions that ran contrary to Hardell's opinion.[14]

In 2012, based on Hardell's research, Italy's supreme court ruled that a business executive's brain tumor was caused by his cell phone use.[15]

References
  1. Lennart Hardell Bio
  2. "Industry 'paid top cancer expert'". BBC News. 8 December 2006. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  3. Associated Press. "Cancer study may help Motorola suit". USA Today. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  4. Hardell, L.; Carlberg, M.; Soderqvist, F.; Mild, K. H.; Morgan, L. L. (16 January 2007). "Long-term use of cellular phones and brain tumours: increased risk associated with use for >=10 years". Occupational and Environmental Medicine. 64 (9): 626–632. doi:10.1136/oem.2006.029751. PMC 2092574. PMID 17409179.
  5. Kang, Cecilia (29 June 2010). "Cellphone industry attacks San Francisco's ruling on radiation". Washington Post. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  6. Knapton, Sarah (21 September 2008). "Mobile phones may raise cancer risk in children, study finds". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  7. Associated Press. "Cell phone studies find no 'consistent evidence' of cancer link". USA Today. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  8. Hardell, L (1 June 2005). "Use of cellular telephones and brain tumour risk in urban and rural areas". Occupational and Environmental Medicine. 62 (6): 390–394. doi:10.1136/oem.2004.017434. PMC 1741035. PMID 15901886.
  9. Radford, Tim (17 May 2005). "Rural mobile phone users 'risk tumours'". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  10. Burgess, Adam (27 May 2005). "Dialling up an old panic". Spiked. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  11. Yong, Ed (31 May 2011). "World Health Organisation verdict on mobile phones and cancer". Cancer Research UK. Retrieved 17 February 2016.
  12. Little, M. P.; Rajaraman, P.; Curtis, R. E.; Devesa, S. S.; Inskip, P. D.; Check, D. P.; Linet, M. S. (8 March 2012). "Mobile phone use and glioma risk: comparison of epidemiological study results with incidence trends in the United States". BMJ. 344 (mar08 1): e1147–e1147. doi:10.1136/bmj.e1147. PMC 3297541. PMID 22403263.
  13. Kelsh, M.A; Shum, M.; Sheppard, A.R.; Mcneely, M.; Kuster, N.; Lau, E.; Weidling, R.; Fordyce, T.; Kuhn, S.; Sulcer, C. (2011). "Measured radiofrequency exposure during various mobile-phone use scenarios". Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology. 21: 343–354. doi:10.1038/jes.2010.12.
  14. Milloy, Steven (4 October 2002). "Cell Phone Suit Gets Bad Reception". Fox News. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
  15. "Italy court ruling links mobile phone use to tumor". Reuters. 19 October 2012. Retrieved 7 November 2014.
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