Study: No Link Between Mobile Phone Use, Tumors

A major four-year study has concluded that using a mobile phone does not increase the likelihood of developing glioma, the most common type of brain tumor.

Scientists at the Institute of Cancer Research in London announced their results on Friday and stressed that their results were consistent with findings of most studies done in Europe and the U.S. New cases of brain tumors exceed 4,000 in the United Kingdom and 20,000 in the United States, but studies—including this most recent one—continue to deny a link between these brain tumors and the use of mobile phones.

Previous studies found increased risk, but researchers stressed that earlier mobile phones used analog technology, which emitted signals of a higher power and danger than today’s digital-signal phones.

The Institute for Cancer Research study involved more than 2,000 people. Of those, 1,716 were healthy volunteers and 966 had glioma tumors.

Overall, we found no raised risk of glioma associated with regular mobile phone use and no association with time since first use, lifetime years of use, cumulative hours of use, or number of calls,” said Professor Patricia McKinney, of the University of Leeds. The report appeared in the British Medical Journal.

“Overall, our findings are consistent with this and with most studies on mobile phone use,” McKinney added.