Posted on by Californiacontrarian

It’s My Duty

The other day after I read some very interesting health related news, I decided that it’s my duty to pass it on to all my readers, both liberal and conservative.

First to be clear, I do not have a “fancy phone.” Yes, I still have a landline (another topic for another day!), but here specifically I am referring to my non-fancy cell phone, which is a flip-phone and I am not sure how much of the following is pertinent to flip-phone users.

What I read about was the health related consequences of cell phone usage.

First a little background. A study published in The Canadian Journal of Cardiology states that hypertension is one of the primary risk factors for heart attacks and strokes and a leading cause of premature death worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO)’s estimation, around 1.28 billion adults aged 30 to 79 worldwide suffer from hypertension.

In other words hypertension (high blood pressure) is bad.

From Epoch Health:

According to a study published on May 4 on the European Society of Cardiology’s (ESC) website, compared with people who talk on their mobile phones for less than 30 minutes per week, those who talk for half an hour or longer have a 12 percent higher risk of developing hypertension. 

In this study, researchers followed 212,046 participants for up to 12 years (median time) and found that 13,984 participants (6.6 percent) were diagnosed with hypertension. Mobile phone users had a 7 percent higher risk of developing hypertension than nonusers.

( At this point, you might be saying, “7%! … not a big deal. Move on!)

Moreover, increasing weekly time spent on a cellphone was associated with increasing risk of developing hypertension … more than 6 hours per week was associated with a 25% risk.

(Now a 25% risk of developing something that may kill you is a big deal. Pay attention!)

Importantly, among mobile phone users, years of use and use of a hands-free device/speakerphone were not significantly associated with the development of hypertension.

 Now I suppose that one might say that this cellphone – hypertension risk is old news, as far back as 1998, an article published in The Lancet reported that exposure to mobile phone radiation increases the risk of cardiovascular hypertension.

However, to me, this recent study adds quantification to the risk associated with cellphone usage. In addition, it’s my duty to inform you of any data that may indicate that flip phones may make a comeback!!

6/22/23

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