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Health and Safety Information
163
Health and Safety
FDA belongs to an interagency working group of the federal agencies
that have responsibility for different aspects of RF safety to ensure
coordinated efforts at the federal level. The following agencies belong
to this working group:
♦National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
♦Environmental Protection Agency Federal Communications
Commission
♦Occupational Safety and Health Administration
♦National Telecommunications and Information Administration
♦The National Institutes of Health participates in some interagency
working group activities, as well.
FDA shares regulatory responsibilities for wireless phones with the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC). All phones that are
sold in the United States must comply with FCC safety guidelines
that limit RF exposure. FCC relies on FDA and other health agencies
for safety questions about wireless phones.
FCC also regulates the base stations that the wireless phone
networks rely upon. While these base stations operate at higher
power than do the wireless phones themselves, the RF exposures
that people get from these base stations are typically thousands of
times lower than those they can get from wireless phones. Base
stations are thus not the primary subject of the safety questions
discussed in this document.
4. What is FDA doing to find out more about the possible health
effects of wireless phone RF?
FDA is working with the U.S. National Toxicology Program and with
groups of investigators around the world to ensure that high priority
animal studies are conducted to address important questions about
the effects of exposure to radio frequency energy (RF).
FDA has been a leading participant in the World Health Organization
International Electromagnetic Fields (EMF) Project since its inception
in 1996. An influential result of this work has been the development
of a detailed agenda of research needs that has driven the
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