Housing, work & access barriers

Personal Statement Re: EMF, RF, and Wireless Radiation Exposure: I am submitting this comment as a concerned citizen and someone who has been personally effected by wireless radiation. In 2009, in the middle of the day, there was a knock on our door. I opened it and it was a utility worker. He said he was going to switch out our meter to a smart meter and it would only take about 10 minutes. I said “Ok” and went about my business in our house. Almost immediately (within 24 hours) everyone in our house began having problems and unexplained health issues. We homeschool our kids and so we were home a lot. My 10 year old son began coming up to me, multiple times a day, complaining that his ears were buzzing and he couldn’t make it stop. My husband began complaining headaches, which progressed to migraines. I began having a variety of issues such as dizziness and racing heart. Our baby was noticeably bothered, crying and not sleeping—we all were having sleep disturbance. Trying to figure out why our family was falling apart suddenly took me on a long journey starting on the internet. I kept coming back to the day it all started and the utility worker who showed up at our door and the smart meter placement—I knew, intuitively, this is what had changed in our environment. After much research, which was more sparse at the time, it was apparent that we were suffering with commonly known effects of the smart meter. I have been told that at some houses, they place “collector meters” which collects data from the neighboring houses, and that these give off more EMF radiation than other meters. With our lives turned upside down, we eventually moved out-of-state and to a house with no smart meter—and our symptoms dissipated; yet we are now more sensitive to wireless exposures. We can tell when we are in wireless saturated environments. Places we used to enjoy, like the library, certain stores or restaurants near cell towers, malls, etc., are almost unbearable to stay at for any length of time. Even though our smart meter experience had a negative impact on our lives, we were able to make adjustments to everyday living which kept us healthier and more vital in the long run; things such as hardwiring our internet, keeping a wifi-free environment at home, using shielding on modems/routers when we travel, using cellphones only when needed (mostly keeping them off) and having a landline phone. We can see the difference it has made in our lives and our kids' lives, especially compared to other kids who are our kids' age who seem to have trouble with keeping attention and are generally more agitated. Yet we cannot live in a bubble. Traveling can make it difficult to control our environment. In one instance, when we were traveling, we were staying at an Airbnb and it felt awful there for ALL of us, despite unplugging the wifi router. I brought out my TriField EMF meter and the found where the exposure was. It was outside the house. The house was next to the highway with 5G antenna poles placed all along the highway. We were all bothered while there and couldn’t sleep. I got in the car and slept about a mile down the road and we left the next morning as soon as the sun came up. Going on this journey, I have spoken to many people about this issue and have heard so many stories, like mine, from a host of people; people who have been permanently disabled by wireless radiation—like those who were living in apartment buildings on the opposite wall of an entire panel of utility meters that were switched out with smart meters and can no longer function in society. I know some people who live like refugees because they can’t get away from wireless exposures, so they live in their cars. I have heard stories from longtime teachers who suffer in their classrooms and see the harm it is causing to the students, who became agitated, have headaches, and can’t think like they used to after wireless was introduced in their classrooms. The teachers try to decrease the exposures in the classroom, with limited success and without administration support. I respectfully request and implore you to reassess the exposure limits of all wireless devices and infrastructure and look at the effects it has on our health and well being as well as to the natural world. There are so many studies that show the harmful biological effects, going back many, many decades out of Israel, Italy, Russia etc. These, as well as the large body of more recent studies should be more than enough to light the way to what has been going on, more than simply looking at thermal (heat) effects. Please do the right thing for our citizens, our children, animals, pollinators, birds and our entire world and look at the large body of independent, biological studies on wireless radiation. Please also look at what other industrial countries have done to limit wireless/EMF exposure and protect their citizens. Thank you-

Question 3 Thank you for the opportunity to share with you my personal experience of exposure to ElectroMagnetic Radiation (EMR). I became sensitive to EMR when electricity smart meters were first installed in my area. I did not know that they had been installed on the houses two properties away from mine. I couldn’t understand why I was suddenly sleeping poorly, waking at exactly 1.30 AM and 5.00 AM every morning. I would wake with what seemed like an adrenaline burst and it would take me 2 hours to get back to sleep. Given that I was working at the time, this was not conducive to performing well in my job and it contributed to my job loss shortly after. This rendered me unable to ever work again as my new electro-sensitivity meant every work place was now a threat, due to pervasive EMR from wi-fi networks, cell phones, and numerous other RF emitting devices. After two weeks, I recalled that smart meters were due to be installed around that time and when I asked the neighbor two properties away, he said that a smart meter had been installed on their property on the very day I started experiencing insomnia. I had been alerted to the problems with smart meters several months earlier by a TV news report. Some people like to say that electro-sensitivity is a nocebo effect. But it took me two weeks to make the connection between my new insomnia and the installation of smart meter. I experience a large variety of symptoms, including heart problems, insomnia, stinging pains in my body, agitation, head pain, dry eyes, skin and lips, and neuropathy, but I challenge the ‘nocebo experts’ to explain to me how I can knowingly will my nose to bleed when exposed to EMR. I have spent thousands of dollars trying to protect myself from RF entering my home and body. But every time I think I’ve achieved some level of success in protecting myself, a new source of RF invades my home, leaving me struggling to address the new situation. It is a case of two steps forward, three steps back. I have given up all my recreational activities due to the impossibility of avoiding cell phones and cell phone tower radiation. I am a prisoner in my home, but my home isn’t safe either. I have to ‘pick my poison’. Becoming sensitive to radio frequencies has also made me sensitive to other types of EMR, such as magnetic fields, electric fields on wiring and harmonics on wiring (dirty electricity). My life has been turned upside down by radio frequencies. This is not a minor inconvenience. Hardly an hour goes by when I am not in distress from one or more symptoms. Others have been forced to move to remote, inhospitable locations, often even leaving family members behind in the city. Some have committed suicide. And yet, research papers (usually those funded by industry) can find no cause for concern with RF. ORSAA in Australia (https://www.orsaa.org/) has collated hundreds of research papers to show a plethora of papers finding health effects from EMR. Clearly protection standards are inadequate. I became ill over a decade ago from EMR that was a lower frequency and lower pervasiveness than I am currently exposed to. My health has continued to deteriorate with each new environmental EMR assault. If my body couldn’t cope over a decade ago, how much less can it cope today with ubiquitous cell phones, wi-fi networks, cell towers, smart watches, etc, etc.? The strength of RF signals needs to be decreased. Wired internet connections should be used where possible, especially in hospitals, nursing homes and schools. Cell phone towers should not duplicate coverage. Rather, providers should share their resources so that people are not assaulted by multiple cell towers in range of each other. Cell phones should be more stringently tested to ensure that they do not exceed safety standards. We need to investigate the multiplicity of electro-sensitivity symptoms and stop relying on the thermal effect as if only heating of tissues causes distress. I am also concerned about magnetic fields from electricity substations and power lines. The protection standards are woefully inadequate. Building biologists recommend lower than 2 mG, but ICNIRP recommends below 2,000 mG. That’s a huge difference. I am alarmed at the number of buildings being erected with substations incorporated into them. Who is spending their day on the other side of the wall/floor/ceiling from the substation? And it seems that it is now ok to build homes close to high voltage powerlines. In fact, if the powerlines run underground where no-one can see them, power companies are happy to install high voltage powerlines within a metre of (existing) homes. I should know; that is the situation I am in. All of this is also contributing to high ground current which then enters the home as harmonics/dirty electricity.

I write this as a person who has not been able to be a part of society for the last 9 years. Not able to grocery shop or go anywhere there is a mobile phone tower, any Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or someone using any digital device because of the pain and harm it causes my body. The pain is felt immediately when someone comes near me with any digital device. I can feel it before I see it. Therefore have not been able to work or do usual activities and as a result have been forced to live in a rare place with no RF frequencies and NO LIFE. The difference in health and pain levels is enormous. I know someone who cannot even use a computer to fill this comment out as she has to live with no power whatsoever. Our whole lives have been taken away from us due to other people using digital devices and what I see as absolutely no regulation due to the $$$ being made at our health's expense. There have been enough studies for decades and enough researchers, scientists and doctors speaking about the harms but they are silenced. I have not been able to live in my own home due to the 100's of towers and devices nearby trespassing into it and being assaulted. I understand the safety testing fake person mannequin SAMe is based on a man weighing more than 4 times than I do. This is a big deal and fake science used by the industry for illusion of safety. This certainly does not protect children. You also do not get any disability or care help or acknowledgment of disability impairment from bodily assault. What we do get however is to be an outcast and excluded from society. Please remove all digital wireless technology as it is very harmful to all life. Thank you! See attached file(s)

My name is Anita Gehrke and I live in New York State. My health was compromised after Central Hudson placed a digital "smart" meter on my home. Living in my house for months with that meter was virtually impossible and my health deteriorated. My home is my sanctuary and I should have the right to have devices of my choice and which do no harm me. We need an analog meter choice.

On Sep 30, 2019 I was stopped at a red light in Boston and immediately felt like I was being zapped by electricity. My heart started racing, felt dizzy, and felt the sensation of a vice around my head. A small cell 4G antenna was on top of the light pole approx 15 feet from my car. I never noticed this antenna before at that intersection. My symptoms subsided within a few hours. After that experience, whenever I go to Boston I feel similar symptoms which are caused by the high number of small cell 4G/5G antennas: head pressure, feeling ‘off kilter’, various degrees of dizziness/vertigo, feeling ‘wired’ like I drank 10 cups of coffee, and loud tinnitus. I’ve only experienced tinnitus that ‘loud’ if I was at a loud concert (decades ago) or in Boston or other cities with many small cells. I used to work in Boston and never felt these symptoms prior to 2019. In Manhattan at the corner of 3rd Ave and E. 45th there is a cell ‘tower’ with many 4G and 5G antennas placed on the roof of a small 1 story sandwich shop. In Feb 2020, I measured the RF from across 3rd Ave. It was 2896 milliwatts (so 2,896,000 microwatts) per sq meter. Ever since getting ‘attacked’ by the small cell antennas, I now get symptoms of slight dizziness and/or head pressure when I am near a router or wifi access point on the ceilings of public buildings, restaurants, etc. The symptoms also linger hours after exposure. I live approx ¼ mile from cellular antennas. I own a meter that measures RF in milliwatts per sq meter, which is set to building biologist standards. With my 3G smartphone years ago I got 5 bars of service from home and the RF reading (not on a phone call) was approx. 3.4 milliwatts per sq meter. With my newer 4G LTE phone when 3G was discontinued, even though I was in the same home, I only got 2 bars of coverage and the RF reading (not in a call) ranged between 34 and 350 milliwatts per sq meter . I stopped using a smart phone as a result of this 10 to 100 fold increase in RF exposure since 3G went away and haven’t had wifi turned on in my home for ten years to reduce my exposure. Worst of all is the AMI smart meter installation that the electric companies have rolled out. I live in one of the few states that allow an opt out. However, my neighbors didn’t opt out and the same day the meters were installed, the side of my head and face felt tingly (occurs when I am closest to the bank of 8 AMI meters-approx 10 feet away). The only other time the side of my face/head ever felt tingly was when I was within 4 feet of a wifi access point that was attached to a wall at a school 8 yrs ago. I occasionally feel a sensation of a quick ‘jab’ to my brain which lasts 2 seconds, constant head pressure/ feeling like a band is tightly wrapped around my head while I’m at home, insomnia, and heart skipped beats, irregular heartrate, tachycardia and a few episodes of atrial flutter. These symptoms all occurred and are getting worse after the AMI meters were installed, likely caused by the RF pulses every 15 seconds and/or the increase in dirty electricity caused by the AMI meters. I didn’t have the tingly head/ head pressure/ stabbing to head sensation, tachycardia, etc symptoms in my home with the prior AMR meters. When I leave the house the head pressure completely goes away but comes back again every time I return home. I needed to spend $$$ on building biologist phone consults, a meter, shielding fabrics, etc, to try to tolerate living in my own home after the AMI meters were installed and I know people that needed to move after the AMI meters were installed on their homes. The shielding fabrics didn’t help that much. The best way to reduce symptoms is to reduce/eliminate exposure and that cannot be done with AMI smart meters in neighborhoods. The meters pulse every 15 seconds or so which is harmful to all of us, whether or not we feel symptoms, due to oxidative stress and many other ill effects. In addition: I am forced to purchase cars at least 10 years old to avoid being blasted by RF in the new cars due to all the technology in newer cars. Difficult to travel in a plane due to passengers using their devices and now some airlines incorporated a drop down ‘shelf’ for the passenger in the next row to place their phone in to watch in flight movies, with their phone’s antennas inches from the back of our heads. The readings in the plane that I have taken vary from approx. 2.9 to 9 milliwatts per sq meter. At hotels, I need to find a room as far away from wifi hot spots to try to get a good night sleep and to avoid symptoms. I wish hotels didn't replace their wired internet in guest rooms with wifi. I used to enjoy spending time in large cities but over the past decade I now sadly need to avoid them due to the extremely high levels of EMF. I feel fortunate that I at least know what is causing my symptoms. So many people have symptoms and they have no idea what is causing them. See attached files

I always was highly sensitive for everything because I have light autism, with strong sensory differences, plus I have migraine. My sensitivity started with the 2G system, I felt anxiety and shoulder, neck muscle hardness, and I’ve started grinding my teeth. I had a mobile phone, nut I could not use it because any time I put it to my ear my ear started aching, and the area around my ear. With 3G my experience was the same, I could't use it. I have a wireless tablet, I used it many times and I get strong migraine after I used it, in my workplace there was a router on my desk next to me less than 1 meter, that short time I worked in this workplace I had headache almost every day. I didn't know it was becuase of the tablet and router. I only noticed after using tablet that my right eye was more wide open and felt stiffer than my left eye. When I touched it, I had the sensation that it was bulging out. The eye naturally has a certain depth, and when you place your hands over both eyes, I felt as though my right eyeball was protruding. When I pressed on my eyeball, as if I were trying to push it back into its proper position, I felt pain. It also felt as though there was fluid or some other substance behind my eye, or throughout that side of my forehead, pushing my eye outward. This kept happening repeatedly after using wireless tablet. I also noticed that after prolonged use, I would experience pain in my breasts, usually in my right breast. I never went to a doctor because of the pain, so I don't know whether there was a lump or anything else. I simply noticed that after each extended period of tablet use, my right breast would also hurt. Once I realised that the tablet was causing these symptoms, I stopped using not only my phone but also my tablet, and the symptoms disappeared. However, other symptoms did not go away. I became disorganised and no longer had the energy to tidy up. This was when the fatigue began, and it has continued to this day, I was anxious even though I had no reason to be anxious. I went to see a psychologist, who told me that she considered me completely normal. I was told that I was not coping with stress properly, but what I could not understand was what the stress was in the first place. Apparently, I had no reason to feel stressed or worry about anything!!!!4G phones with built-in GPS and other features arrived on the market. Naturally, I could not use either 3G or 4G close to my head because they caused immediate pain, but these smartphones already allowed users to access the internet. I tried it myself, too. Unfortunately, after about one minute of use, I had to put the phone aside and stop browsing the internet on it because of severe pain behind my eyes, pain in my temples, and other strange sensations, such as tingling in my skin and bones. If other people's phones were near me (and this is still the case today), I could easily sense what I perceived as radiation coming from their phones. I would become dizzy, develop a headache, and experience tiny pinprick-like sensations on my skin. When I sat in an area with Wi-Fi, I also felt intense pressure in my temples, even deep inside my bones. I had an internet connection installed at home, and the provider supplied a router. However, whenever I switched it on, I would develop a headache. After experiencing this repeatedly, I came to the conclusion that these wireless devices were causing my episodes of feeling unwell. So I gradually realized something I didn’t know at first: that wireless devices were causing my health problems. I had to gave back the router and internet to the provider. I started a new job where I had to work with laptops in a room where the laptops were connected to WiFi. I didn’t want to say that these things make me sick – obviously that’s not how you start at a new workplace – but after just a few minutes I became so dizzy and my vision got so blurry that I had to leave the building. After that I went to a psychologist because I was worried about how I could tell an employer that I feel unwell from the laptop and WiFi. He encouraged me to stand up for myself and explain the problem, but at the workplace the response was that they couldn’t do without these devices, so I had to leave. I’m also sensitive to GPS, though I didn’t know that at first either and used it in the car. I had to stop twice because I got dizzy, still not knowing what was causing it. Then the third time I felt much worse: I was dizzy, had a terrible migraine, vision problems, and was on the verge of fainting. I had to pull over, and there I fainted; the ambulance took me away. In the hospital I told them that I had become unwell after turning on the GPS, and the doctor said that many people are sensitive to it. Lately 5G proximity bothers me; I feel the radiation. Life fully limited – I avoid so much, big disadvantage in work and normal life.

I first noticed a light headed feeling when I was close to a modem many years ago. When I moved to another room, the feeling subsided. The next experience was when our power company installed smart meters wherever it was most convenient for them. They put one on my bedroom wall and I was dizzy, light headed and unable to sleep. I had to move and when it happened again at another rental unit, I was told I was too sensitive. I am unable to be close to modems for more than 15 minutes as I get dizzy and light headed, and have chosen to shut them off at night in order to sleep more soundly. I have found that I cannot live in some places because of the EMF fields and the radio frequencies, etc. and that if I can put up a 16" piece of sheet metal, on the wall where the smart meter or fuse box is, I cannot pretty much mitigate the intensity of the waves. I recently was visiting a home of a friend and felt very strange and light headed, almost losing my balance when I entered the bathroom, and it subsided when I went into the other room down the hall. I went back to that area and the same thing happened. I asked my friend and she said that their TV satellite dish was on the roof right at that room. And when I went into the bedroom to take a nap, the same thing happened. I looked on the wall and the smart meter was right on the bedroom wall and the neighbor's Satellite dish on their roof was aimed right at the bedroom as well. I had to leave the home as I was starting to feel very shaky from the EMF's and radio waves. Some of us are truly more sensitive than others to EMF, radio frequency waves and wifi. The cell towers they are putting into our communities are put right in front of people's homes and there are numerous cases of children and adults getting symptoms and there is nothing we can do about it because the county gave them permission to "help" us have better cell phone access and they are not required to alert the homeowners and phone companies are able to put them where they feel it is best for their company. We, the people, would like to have choice about our bodies and how we are impacted by new technologies. Smart meters should be put on garages where no one lives and not on our bedroom walls. And now we have new AI data centers that are being built with no care for the impact on the populations nearby. I cannot sleep with the modem on at night and have had to shut it off to avoid the way it impacts my sleep and my brain function. My hand starts aching when I hold my cell phone for more than 10 minutes. I use some protections that are sold by companies claiming to have devices that block the EMF's but they do not block them completely. I feel relieved when the phone is on airplane mode but still, the only full relief I feel is when it is shut off completely. I only can share personal experiences and have no documents to prove anything. I request that you please expedite safety reviews of the new technologies that will be even stronger than 5 G. As well as how we can be protected from all the smart meters and cell towers and computers that are everywhere emitting radio frequencies and wifi signals that truly have an impact on our bodies and brains and immune systems. There have not been enough research studies done to clearly document the impacts. And the research needs to be across a large population of children, adolescents and elders and those who have compromised health issues already, because I truly believe that we are harming ourselves and our families by not having protections available and having choice about what the new technology companies can do without our permission. Thank you for finally considering science do research about this. In our area, those of us who have the financial means to hire specialists come to our homes to use expensive meters that can check for "dirty electricity" and for EMF exposure and help us find ways to shield ourselves from the impacts on our bodies when we have not been able to figure out why we are not feeling well and there is no reason for it. And then we find out that our homes have very high EMF and radio frequencies and that the cell towers close by are all contributing to the high readings.

A neighbor of mine, a former public official in a very responsible position has begun suffering from anxiety for the first time in his long life coincident with the rollout of 5G in our town. Doctors have been unable to find the cause. This person is now retired, spending most of his time at home helping with extended family child care. About 6 months ago a 5G station was installed on a pole on his street about 10 yards from his house. His formerly episodic anxiety has become nearly continuous and grown worse. In August he went on a two week family vacation in a fairly remote area with no cell service. He experienced a complete lack of anxiety at that location. His anxiety returned with a vengeance a few hours after he returned home. His doctor has advised him to move from his life long home to a rural location without cell service. This is not a controlled study, but as a natural history experiment it strongly suggests that there are serious health impacts from cell phone system radiation.

Dear Sirs/Madams, I am requesting that the same level of consideration be given to persons with the functional impairment of electromagnetic sensitivity that would be accorded to any other disabled person. I know that doing so would disrupt great plans, but workarounds have been found for people with other disabilities. The argument that electromagnetic sensitivity does not exist and is just a figment of the sufferers imagination has been debunked numerous times. I attach two studies that I have on hand. I also request that the health of children, in particular, be considered in the deployment of wireless equipment. Prof. Oleg Grigoriev of Russia's committee on non-ionizing radiation protection has said that, while he does not oppose the use of wireless communication, every home should have at least one room with low levels, and that room should be the children's room. Children should also limit the amount of time they spend engaging in high-exposure activities. Wired Internet connections can be installed in schools to reduce children's exposure there. Thirdly, the environment needs to be considered. We face an extinction crisis due to many factors, all of which come back to human activities. I have witnessed a stepwise reduction of biodiversity in my neighborhood as new radiating infrastructure is introduced. The most notable reductions occurred shortly after smart electric meters were installed in the neighborhood and after 5G transmissions began. I attach my most recent observations in rural Japan, which include links to similar observations elsewhere. Most importantly regarding the future of our environment and humanity itself, people are noting a loss not only of pollinators, but of pollen itself, resulting in failure to fruit and sterile seeds when they do develop. The use of wireless radiation should take the environment into consideration and be limited to local urban centers, again ensuring that the full range of necessary services are available to persons who cannot tolerate or who should otherwise be protected from high-EMR environments.

I am a member of the public who has measured radiofrequency radiation using the Safe and Sound Pro II meter as well as electric and magnetic field strengths using the ME 3840B from Gigahertz Solutions. My family has been forced to move after developing symptoms including headaches, insomnia, nosebleeds, vomiting, muscle spasms, memory issues, and seizures from exposure to levels of non-ionizing radiation (RF-EMF peak 500,000+ μW/m2, magnetic field of 400+ nT) below the FCC limit that resolved with dramatically reduced exposure (RF-EMF peak less than 10 μW/m2, magnetic field less than 100 nT). Even childrens’ toys have wireless capabilities today. Establishing truly safe exposure levels is essential. I am writing to encourage you to consider the experiences of families like mine, the weight of scientific evidence already available, and the need for further study to protect the public health and to urge you to reconsider the current limits in light of the fact that they are not protective of human or environmental health. I appreciate your time and attention in reviewing the accompanying studies.