All stimuli which are capable of affecting biological processes can be either beneficial or adverse, as expressed by the 16th century doctor Paracelsus. It all depends on dose and application. For example, applied once or twice, the use of steroids may be extremely beneficial to the body, whereas chronic, repetitive use is very adverse.

Numerous biological experiments and decades of therapeutical applications confirm that this century-old wisdom applies to EMF exposures as well. In the former Soviet Union (FSU), in particular, controlled EMF exposures have been and still are widely used for the treatment of millions of people for many different adverse conditions. It is used to alleviate stress reactions, stimulate tissue and bone repair and regeneration, protect against ionizing radiation and facilitate recovery in a wide range of diseases.

The research in FSU on adverse effects as well as beneficial use of EMF exposure has been extensively reviewed by scientists at Brooks Air Force Base and the U.S. Army Medical Research Detachment of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, San Antonio, Texas, [ref. 22]. According to the authors, publications on MW EMF-related topics in FSU number twice as many as publications in the rest of the world taken together.

According to the Army and Air Force scientists, EMF therapy in the FSU involves repetitive short local exposures of certain body areas with low intensity EMF. The area(s) to be exposed, the radiation frequency, waveform and modulation, and daily duration of procedures are determined by a physician based on the disease and the condition of the particular patient. The radiation intensity is usually regarded as a less important variable, as long as it does not heat or damage the tissue. For most diseases, the daily exposures vary from 15 to 60 minutes, and the therapy lasts for 8-15 days.

FSU publications on the clinical use of EMF number in the hundreds. Many claim that EMF therapy is more effective than conventional methods such as drug therapy, for a variety of diseases and disorders. One great advantage of EMF therapy is that it is non-invasive. In some cases, EMF has helped patients who had already tried all other known therapies without success and were considered incurable. At the same time, EMF seldom caused any adverse effects or allergies. EMF in combination with drug therapy facilitated favorable effects and/or reduced adverse side effects of drugs. Some authors reported that EMF might be highly effective or not effective at all, contingent on the patient’s condition, individual sensitivity to EMF, and parameters of irradiation. This is equivalent to findings of researchers in the West, showing that EMF induced effects vary highly with genetics and other parameters.

Diseases reported to be successfully treated with EMF in the FSU belong to rather diversified groups. The most common applications of EMF are for gastric and duodenal ulcers; cardiovascular diseases, including angina pectoris, hypertension, ischemic heart disease, infarction; respiratory sicknesses, including tuberculosis, sarcoidosis, bronchitis, asthma; and skin diseases, including wounds, trophic ulcers, burns, atopic dermatitis. Isolated studies claimed successful EMF treatment for asthenia, neuralgia, diabetes mellitus, osteochondrosis, acute viral hepatitis, glomerulonephritis, and alcoholism.

It is interesting to note that many of the therapeutical uses of EMF exposures are directly related to reports of potentially adverse biological and health effects of EMF exposures in the West, such as accelerated cell proliferation rate. EMF is also widely used in the West for clinical treatment of bone fractures and tissue wounds.

In the West, the Catholic University of America (CUA) in Washington, D.C. is doing extensive research on EMF exposed chicken embryos. They have found that short exposures of EMF caused the embryos to be able to survive simulated heart attacks (anoxia conditions) far better than unexposed embryos. However, if the embryos were subjected to chronic, repetitive exposures, the results were opposite [ref. 46].

Professor Litovitz, leader of CUA’s research team on these issues, has a reasonable explanation to the observed effects. Short exposures of EMF stimulate the living system to produce stress proteins (also called heat shock proteins) which are important factors of the cell’s and body’s general defense mechanisms. However, repetitive exposures cause the living system to down-regulate the stress response mechanism in order to avoid exhaustion. When the system, in this down-regulated condition, is next exposed to another stressor (e.g., anoxia, infection, ionizing radiation, etc.) which may be a serious threat to its life, it may not have enough stress proteins to fight the adverse stressor. The principle of down-regulation is well-established and an accepted phenomenon in biology and medicine, fundamental to many biological responses [ref. 14, 16, 47, 48].

Recently, other beneficial effects of EMFs have been reported by research teams in the West.

Scientists working at Bristol University and the Bristol Royal Infirmary in the UK, led by Dr. Alan Preece, have reported a faster reaction time in humans subjected to cellular phone microwave exposures [ref. 49]. Dr. Preece stated: "this effect could be a slight warning of the brain leading to increased blood flow, or alternatively a change in protein synthesis (which is caused by a reaction of the body’s defense mechanism), leading to the same effect".

A team of scientists from the Pettis VA Medical Center in Loma Linda, California, in 1998 [ref. 10] reported that cell phone radiation in some circumstances decreased DNA damage, in other circumstances the cell phone radiation increased DNA damage. The result was dependent on modulation scheme and exposure intensity.

In summary, a biological effect induced by EMF exposure may lead to an adverse health effect or a beneficial health effect, depending on exposure conditions. Below is pictured the principle in the interaction between EMF and biology, leading either to a beneficial or an adverse health effect.

Fig. 24: EMF exposure can be beneficial or adverse depending on exposure conditions.

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