EHS: Itʼs all in your head but we wonʼt hold it against you
From John Weigel
I would like to draw you attention to a new technique being used in Ireland to foster the idea that electromagnetic sensitivity is a psychological disorder. Unlike Sweden which has declared EHS a disability, Ireland has chosen to deny the condition exists. At present there is a concerted effort to remove the stigma attached to mental illness. What is curious is the individuals and companies that are seeking to address the issue. In this instance they are drawn from the business community – and nearly all of the members of the board of the Network for Responsible Business are currently or past employees of the microwave industry.
It is also important to note that Ireland plans to be an incubation centre for technologies using the Smart Grid which is currently under construction across North America and elsewhere through partnership between government and business.
Kind regards,
John Weigel
Itʼs all in your head but we wonʼt hold it against you
By John Weigel
Concerned about the stigma of mental illness? Fret not, microwave industry and Big Pharma players are hosting a party…
Is industry attempting to control the argument over microwave – electromagnetic frequency safety by focussing on mental health?
In one of the most cynical attempts to influence public opinion, a group of former industry mandarins has gathered to sponsor a public forum on mental health as the Network for Responsible Business. NRB is sponsoring what it calls a “major conference” Nov. 26 in Dublin for businesses and non-profit organizations aimed at reducing the stigma of mental health issues in Irish communities. The Community Foundation for Ireland (CFI) and See Change are collaborating and co-funding the event in partnership with AHEAD, Business in the Community Ireland, IBEC, Kanchi, SOS and The Equality Authority.
Emphasis on changing societal attitudes to metal health issues puts the responsibility for illness on sufferers and society. This represents a marked change in practice where the first line of treatment for people suffering ill health is to remove the cause of the illness. The pervasiveness of electromagnetic frequencies is simply ignored.
Clearly the government and industry are intent on imposing the Smart Grid on the people of Ireland.
Scientists have long known that microwaves affect mood and well being, Companies using microwave technology can not be insured because Swiss Re, the company responsible for giving back-up to general and health insurers has refused to protect the industry against injury claims from the burgeoning use of microwave communications including cell phones, wireless routers, baby monitors, communications masts and pylons.
In Ireland, the effects of microwave technology are officially denied by government and patients are either treated for their symptoms or referred to psychiatric evaluation. Doctors are being instructed that symptoms associated with microwaves fall into two treatment categories: medicate or label a patient with a psychiatric condition. Medicine has become a client of the state and subject to the influence of industry.
Evidence of government policy was provided in a 2007 memorandum on the Health Effects of Electromagnetic Fields published by the Department of Communication, Marine and Natural Resources which states:
“The only established adverse health effect associated with mobile phone use is an increase in traffic accidents when they are used while driving.
“No adverse short of long-term health effects have been found from exposure to the radio frequency signals produced by mobile phones and bas station transmitters.
“EHS is a collection of subjective symptoms, such as headaches, sleeplessness, depression, skin and eye complaints, that sufferers attribute to EMF exposure. Research has not established any link between EMF exposure and the occurrence of EHS symptoms.
The Irish government, including the health service, bases its out-dated advice on an expert panel which included Anders Ahlbom, of the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm who was forced to withdraw from the panel that ultimately classified microwave radiation as a Class 2B carcinogen.
In addition to the fact that medical practitioners are not educated to recognize the effects of electromagnetic radiation, Dr. Sarah Doyle, acting specialist in Public Health medicine briefed a regional health forum of the Acute Hospital and Population Health Committee in how to construct a model for people suffering from the effects of radiation poisoning. In a marked departure from traditional methods of removing the patient from the cause of the symptoms, Dr. Doyle recommended, “GPs in Ireland should be provided with information about the appropriate treatment for EHS symptoms and be informed that the symptoms are NOT due to EMF exposure”. In other words, doctors are being told to use the “bait and switch” technique – obfuscate and medicate. In defense of the medical profession, the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland (RCPI) has requested increased funding to protect patients with compromised immune systems in the near future when half the Irish population is expected to contract “some form of cancerʼ by the year 2025.”
Members of the NRB board include executives from some of the companies most responsible for the proliferation of microwave damage and whose companies profit the most including pharmaceuticals, communications and energy companies. NRB patron is Irish President Michael D. Higgins, who was supported by media and digital communications mogul, Denis O”Brien.
NRB chairman is Kieran McGowan, retired chairman of Cement Roadstone Holdings who is also a director of Elan Corporation, plc and United Drug, plc. According to the New York Stock Exchange registry information, Elan “is a neuroscience-based biotechnology company. Elan is focused on discovering and developing advanced therapies in neurodegenerative and autoimmune diseases, and in realizing the potential of its scientific discoveries and drug delivery technologies.” The company profits from the drugs administered to people who suffer neurological damage such as sufferers from electromagnetic sensitivity.
Vice Chairman Padraig McManus, is a former chief executive of the Electricity Supply Board (ESB), rebranded as Electric Ireland. Under McManus” stewardship, the ESB / Electric Ireland initiated what was a called a test of the Smart Meter / Smart Grid system of microwave meter reading as well as introducing by stealth a programme to install Smart Meters in industrial estates across the country.
Board member Aileen O”Toole, a founder of the Sunday Business Post, is Managing Director of AMAS, an internet consultancy, based in Leeson Street, Dublin, around the corner from Electric Ireland. AMAS clients include mobile phone network O2 and EPS, a water pumping and waste water treatment firm with links to Smart Meter firm, Aquas. She was appointed by then Tánaiste Mary Harney, coalition government second in command, as a member of the Consumer Strategy Group, which reported to government on consumer issues.
It is relevant to concerns about Harney”s influence regarding NRB and electromagnetic technology because Harney met with community representatives in her constituency who asked for baseline studies and statistics about a documented cancer cluster around the Ronanstown Garda station in her Clondalkin constituency. Harney failed to address their concerns.
The influence of Mary Harney within the NRB continues with another member of the NRB board, her husband, Brian Geoghegan, whom she married in 2001. Vincent Brown”s defunct Village Magazine noted several other curious coincidences. Geoghegan was appointed as head of FAS while she was Minister for Enterprise after leaving IBEC, Irish and business and economic commission and for a brief time as head of MRPA Kinman rebranded as MKC Communications.
In a controversy several years ago, Geoghegan”s consultancy firm was unmasked for seeking information from industry into how the Department of Health should address proposed changes to the advertisement of alcohol. The web site MediaBite noted a report by Irish Times journalist the a proposed voluntary code for advertising alcohol in cinemas was written the a cinema screen advertising company. According to O”Toole, “‘The Department of Health were so subservient to industry that they even used the same grammatical errors as the original version supplied by the company!”
Another NRB board member also has company links to another board member and the pharmaceutical industry. Bryan Mohally is currently Vice President, Supply Chain Operations with Johnson & Johnson, and is also a board member of several other J&J affiliates in Ireland. In 2009, Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy (Janssen AI), a newly formed subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, completed the acquisition of substantially Elan”s assets and rights related to the Alzheimer’s Immunotherapy Program (AIP). Elan”s former board member, McGowan, is also chairman of NRB.
Perhaps the best connection between the NRB”s sponsorship of an event designed to remove the stigma of mental illness and a company at the heart of health safety concerns is Bernie Gray, Chairperson, of EirGrid, the company behind the jailing of Offaly woman Teresa Treacy who refused to allow the erection of a power line across her land. In late October, Gray was photographed with Ben Hurley, CEO of the National Digital Research Centre, the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte,TD and Fintan Slye, chief executive, Eirgrid to launch the Smart Grid Innovation Hub, a new initiative to help companies, entrepreneurs and academics with ideas for the future smart grid to access support from the energy and ICT industries on the island of Ireland and bring products and services to market faster. Quoted on the website Silicon Republic, Slye said, “”This provides us with a unique opportunity in developing smart-grid technology. Supporting innovation in new grid applications is critical and will ensure that the grid works more efficiently and economically in the future.”
Board member of both NRB and the National Digital Research Centre is Paul Rellis, the managing director of Microsoft Ireland.
Two additional NRB board members are the well-known Maurice Pratt, former CEO of the C&C Group as well as a non-executive director of Eircom Group plc as well as the pharmaceutical distribution group Uniphar plc. and Debbie Smith, managing director of Boots Ireland, the U.K.-based pharmacy-led health and beauty retailer.
In Scotland at the moment Broadband over Power Lines, 4G and LTE technology is being deployed amid complaints of sheep dropping dead in the fields, a cluster of elderly people in a nursing home and their GP dying with 24 hours, and the suicide of a talented musician who could not get relief for his Electromagnetic Sensitivity. None of them will be attending the NRB conference on removing the stigma of mental illness. It”s a little late.
When everyone is suffering from the effects of microwaves, there will be no stigma anyway.
– John Weigel
NOTE: the “Be the Change Conference” – Eliminating Stigma surrounding Mental Health in businesses & communities will be held Monday, 26 Nov. 2010 at Chartered Accountants House, 47-49 Pearse Street, Dublin 2 from 8.30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
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