Can mobile phone use cause brain cancer? Here's what WHO-backed study finds

Canberra: Mobile phones are not linked to brain cancers, a World Health Organization-commissioned review by Australian government scientists has concluded.

Researchers from the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) on Wednesday published the results of a systematic review into the potential health effects of radio wave exposure from mobile phones.

The review, commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO), analyzed the results of over 5,000 studies conducted between 1994 and 2022, and found that brain tumor rates have remained steady despite a widespread increase in mobile phone usage in the same period.

"When the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified radio wave exposure as a possible carcinogen to humans in 2013, it was largely based on limited evidence from human observational studies," ARPANSA's Ken Karipidis, who led the review, said in a media release.

"This systematic review of human observational studies is based on a much larger dataset compared to that examined by the IARC, that also includes more recent and more comprehensive studies, so we can be more confident that exposure to radio waves from wireless technology is not a human health hazard."

The research also concluded that there is no link between prolonged mobile phone use or the amount of mobile phone use and cancer.

Karipidis, who is also the vice-chair of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, said the results were consistent with previous ARPANSA research showing there has been no increase in the incidence of brain cancers over the last 20 years.

ARPANSA is the federal government's primary radiation protection authority.