Here are eight ways to minimise the health dangers of mobile phones and cell phone dangers:

• Limit your calls to two minutes when at all possible

• Try to only use your phone when it is showing four to five bars of signal strength

• Ensure that the antenna is as far as possible from the head and hand. Even half an inch makes a huge difference in the strength of the microwave electromagnetic field entering the body

• Do not hold your phone when sending a message or text. Place it on a flat surface then press the 'Send' key and withdraw your hand

• Avoid handsets with internal antennae. These tend to expose the head and hand to higher levels of radiation

• When indoors, always use the phone near a window where signal strength can be up to ten times greater (meaning that the handset powers up less to establish contact with the mast) and always have the handset on the window side (so that less of the signal passes through your head to and from the phone mast)

• The safest set up is probably a hands-free set with a ‘proper’ headset (i.e. not an internal earpiece but a headset like telephone operators or call centre staff use)

• Use the most efficient mobile phone possible. One indication of efficiency is the phone’s ‘talk time’ - the average amount of talk permitted by one battery charge-up. The longer the ‘talk time’ the more efficient the handset, though this could also indicate a particularly efficient battery. The smallest handsets tend to be less efficient

Specific Absorption Rates
Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) measurements (the strengfth of the microwave electormagnetic field emitted by a mobile phone, and soon to be printed on mobile phone handset packages) are a ‘red herring’. They are taken with the handset operating at full power, taking no account of the efficiency of any given handset. In response to low signal strength, an efficient handset powers up less than an inefficient handset, thus exposing the head to lower radiation.

The small differences between handset SAR measurements are more than outweighed by the way you use your phone - see above.

Ed.- In addition, Dr. Joseph Mercola recommends that you only make calls when there is a strong signal. The closer you are to a mobile phone mast, the stronger your signal will be, and the lower the signal your phone has to send out to maintain a connection. Frequent use of your cell phone when you have a weak signal brings a greater risk of health damage because you are exposing your brain to larger amounts of radiation.

If you live in a rural area, often a long way from the nearest phone mast, the signal may always be weak, which is why mobile phone users living in rural areas appear to be 50% more likely to develop a brain tumour than city-dwelling mobile phone users.[1] In this case it would be best to use a landline wherever possible.

The Daily Hazard online newspaper (August 2003) provided this additional advice:

• The angle of the handset is important. Mobile phones transmit signals most efficiently when held in a vertical position. If a phone is laid horizontally, for example-talking while in bed, it needs to emit significantly more radiation to communicate with the nearest mast/base station
• Try not to obstruct the antenna, as this will cause the phone to power up
• Enclosed spaces tend to trap and amplify radiation. If you are in a train or car, open a window and point the phone towards it.
• If you wear metal-rimmed glasses take them off before using your mobile. The metal can increase radiation exposure to the eyes by 20% and to the head by 6.3%. If you are wearing metal earrings, remove those too

In 2000 the Public and Commercial Services Union, whose members include thousands of civil servants, advised its members to minimise mobile phone use. In addition to the usual advice to reduce both the number and length of calls, it recommended that:

• members should not be forced to carry a mobile phone but be issued with phonecards instead
• members should carry phones away from the body whether in use or not
• members should respond to an incoming call with a brief promise to phone back on a normal phone as soon as possible
• members should not press their phones hard against their ears when making calls, but leave a gap

ANOTHER ARTICLE BELOW

A study of 12,000 mobile phone users in Sweden and Norway found “a statistically significant association between calling time/number of calls per day and the prevalence of warmth behind, around or on the ear, headaches and fatigue”. The mobile phone users studied used their phone less than two minutes or two calls per day. They also found dose/response relationships with concentration, memory loss, fatigue and headache for people who used the phones for over one hour per day total. [1]