Prospective Study of Pregnancy Outcomes After Parental Cell Phone Exposure: The Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study

Authored By:

Baste et al

Summary:

This is a cohort study that looked into the possibility of any association between pregnancy outcomes and parental RF EMFexposure to mobile phones. The cohort included more than 100,000 pregnancies from all over Norway, recruited during 1999-2009. Two sets of questionnaires mainly asking about mobile phone use were handed out to the expectant mothers during gestational week 15 and 30. Expectant fathers were also given a questionnaire during gestational week 15. The responses were then assessed against the pregnancy outcomes identified from the birth registry. The authors found no association between parental mobile phone exposure and any of the studied pregnancy outcomes.

Link to:

Link to PubMed abstract

Published In:

Epidemiology 2015: in press

Commentary by ARPANSA:

According to a report by the Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) in 2015, the investigations on RF EMR exposure from mobile phones and reproductive outcomes have not been informative. This is mainly due to methodological limitations including confounding i.e. uncontrolled lifestyle factors. The committee concluded that it is not possible to weigh the evidence due to a lack of informative studies. It is important to note that the study by Baste et al which is a large prospective cohort study, did not find an association.