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ANSES organises a public consultation for its report on electromagnetic hypersensitivity
Today ANSES launches a public consultation of its draft report on electromagnetic hypersensitivity or idiopathic environmental intolerance attributed to electromagnetic fields. Members of the scientific community, physicians and interested stakeholders are invited to provide their comments on the pre-final report through an on-line public consultation which will be open through 30 September 2016. The Agency's objective is to gather additional scientific comments and data that can be taken into account in the final version of the expert assessment report.
Population exposure to radiofrequency waves has been a topic of concern for a number of years both in France and worldwide. Because of this, and in response to requests by its supervisory ministries, the Agency published collective expert assessment opinions and reports in 2003, 2005, 2009, 2013 and most recently, one in 2016 on exposure to radiofrequency waves and child health.
With the development and deployment of new technologies in communications and connected objects within the last twenty years, a growing number of systems and applications use electromagnetic waves in the radiofrequency range (from 8.3 kHz to 300 GHz): mobile telephones, tablets, connected objects, etc. Despite measures implemented to regulate and monitorexposure levels to electromagnetic fields, a certain number of individuals have reported problems that they claim are caused by exposure to these fields.
Within this context, ANSES has issued a formal internal request in order to conduct a specific, in-depth expert assessment of the issue of electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) or idiopathic environmental intolerance attributed to electromagnetic fields (IEI-EMF).The goal of this assessment is to better comprehend the complex EHS phenomenon and to characterise it in order to understand the mechanisms which cause the various symptoms encountered by subjects claiming to suffer from EHS, and to suggest preferential lines of research.
Launch of a public consultation on the pre-final report
ANSES is launching a public consultation today for the pre-final report on this work. The objective of the consultation is to gather additional scientific comments and data that can be taken into account for the final version of the expert assessment report. All the comments received, as well as the Agency’s responses, will be published in an annex to the final report.
The expert assessment presented in the pre-final report is mainly based on a review of the scientific literature, with over 300 publications selected. Due to the complexity of the subject, the limitations of scientific articles, the lack of studies on certain topics and the scientific controversies that result from all of these difficulties, the working group also examined testimony by hospital physicians and general practitioners, researchers, associations, and groups of citizens and elected officials. In all, it heard the testimonies of over twenty individuals and organisation representatives in order to round out its understanding of the subject and more effectively identify the characteristics and specificities of the symptoms of EHS sufferers.
ANSES invites members of the scientific community, physicians and all interested stakeholders to submit their comments regarding this draft report by 30 September 2016 via our online comment form.