EMFs are often compared to other scientific or public-health issues. We discuss some of those comparisons here to draw out the key lesson learned from the comparison.
Smoking - just how big is the public health problem? And do we know the exact mechanism?
Passive smoking - passive smoking is usually accepted as an established carcinogen, but how does the strength of evidence compare to EMFs?
Coffee - something which is classed by IARC like magnetic fields as "possibly carcinogenic" but which we carry on drinking
Shift work - now classified as "probably" carcinogenic, but with the benefit of quite strong animal evidence
Cholera - established in the nineteenth century as a cause of disease on epidemiological evidence alone without knowing a mechanism
BSE - errors made in communicating to the public and lessons on precautionary approaches
We also have a general discussion on comparative risks - how big would any EMF risks be compared to other risks?
