Computers and possible Health Problems.

            

The evidence implicating computer monitors as a cause of caner, skin rash, miscarriage or electrical hypersensitivity is weak, and no scientifically significant results for any such health risks have been reported. Nor should it be forgotten that the difficulties of truly controlling large-scale epidemiological studies are monumental so many other variables affect the individuals participating that it becomes almost impossible to say with certainty that any one factor is the cause of any one event.

            All the studies to date are co-relational rather than causal, that is, they can show that there is some health effect associated with computer use, but cannot prove a true cause and effect relationship. The radiation from the computer terminals could be contributing to health problems, or something else about monitors, or the way a particular study was conducted could have influenced its results. Most importantly, it is certainly not clear what the specific mechanism is by which electromagnetic radiation could affect a biological process such as pregnancy.

            The simplest theory proposes a mechanism similar to the theory of accelerated cell division thought to be implicated in the development of cancer. Since fetal tissue is in a state of almost constant and total division, the possibility of errors occurring during uncontrollably accelerated growth is increased enormously, compared with the risk to the cells of a fully grown adult. Such errors are thought to be the triggers of spontaneous miscarriages.

            The other illnesses discussed here certainly do not require exposure to a computer in order to occur, and the ‘natural’ mechanisms by which they are triggered are no better understood than the computer-related ones. So although the computer cannot be completely cleared of involvement in health problems, neither can it be unequivocally blamed.