PHOTOS, PAGE 1

       Editor and prime reporter is Doug Terry, a veteran television and radio reporter in   Washington, DC, (details below)

Remember how your mom always said do this and don’t do that? You grew tired of the repeating and hearing the lessons over and over? Then you grew up and learned that not everything she was saying was wrong. Then you got more mature and realized that you didn’t have to resent her any more and that much of what she was saying was true and useful.

So it should be now with cell phones. Here is the TerryReport bottom line: no one knows for certain that cell phones are safe to use. What if, 20 years from now, we have 30 million extra cases of brain cancer? Well, the cell phone companies will have spent all that money, their employees will have bought many new cars and houses, but what does the victim do? Will people be looking back and saying, “We’re all such idiots?”

Here are the NEW RULES from the TerryReport about using cell phones and lowering the risk. Also, some tips are added about using phones on the streets, which apply especially to women and teenage readers.

1. If you are on a cell phone more than 4 minutes, you should use an ear piece.
2. If you use a cell phone for 18 or more minutes per day, as much as possible should be on an ear piece.
3. If you have an important call to make while driving, find a place to stop.
4. If you are talking and driving, do so only in areas where traffic is light and the conversation is not stressful in any way.
5. Be prepared to throw down your phone immediately if there is a conflict between driving and talking. Don't worry about the person on the other end. Worry about yourself and your safety.
6. Don't put a cell phone directly on your body and carry it around that way. There are holsters that will shield some of the radiation from your body, so check those out.

7. If you are taking a call in an office or at home, move the call to a landline unless you have an ear piece on. Have the person call you back or you can call them.

8. If you or anyone you know uses a cell extensively inside a car, get an external antenna to move the radiation away from your head. You can get a magnet antenna that links by wire to the phone or one that is wireless. (see Wilson Antennas)

9. Driving and using a cell is a really bad idea. If you don’t think so, put down the damn phone for a few days and carefully watch the behavior of the drivers around you. They are much more likely to take chances, like going late through a changing light, and doing dumb things, like following too closely, etc. We would all like to believe that we are very good at “multi-tasking”, and the younger you are, the more likely you’d like to hold on to that belief.  Driving a car is a full time thing, even if it gets repetitive and boring. Hey, being dead or spending six months in a hospital is boring too, right?

WHEN WALKING ON THE STREET:

1. Never walk down the street talking on a cell phone at night, especially in a big city.  Using a cell phone while walking is not a good idea for women, anytime. Some people are under the impression that no one will bother them while they are connected to someone else. Why? What is the person on the other end of the phone going to do to protect you? If your attention is on the phone, you can't be careful of those who are around you and might intend to do harm.
2. If you have to make more than a 30 sec. call while on city streets, step into the front of a restaurant or other place of business. You are unlikely to be bothered there. Mainly, put off random social calls when in public. There are, of course, situations where you’d be perfectly safe taking a call on the street, but, if you are walking and talking, you might just go passed those places to somewhere you aren’t safe and never notice, because you are talking.
3. The only way a cell phone is likely to help someone being attacked is if the person can give their exact location to police. Otherwise, the attack would likely be over before they could respond. There are times when a cell phone could be a lifeline, but it should not be thought of as a protective shield preventing a criminal from striking. It is just a phone and nothing more. It can summon help and, if someone is able to accomplish that, it is reasonable to assume that most attackers would then flee.

OTHER STUFF

Can it also be said that you should not impose your conversations on other people in public places? Go to some place private or semi-private and talk away. When you have to speak on the phone around other people, keep it short.  (Yes, this kind of courtesy went out sometime around 1998, but, people can always change. There is hope, even if it is smaller than a nano particle?)

3.16.10

EDITOR’S NOTE: This list has been compiled by Doug Terry, a technologist and consultant in communications. It should not be considered a definitive guide and it has been prepared without any direct consultation with law enforcement. Your local police might provide a more complete list of risks, in regard to crime and car crashes, than is presented here.

The risk of cancer might not be known until it is too late to help you, your family and friends. Besides, “cause and effect” in cases of cancer is extremely difficult to establish. Cancers usually develop over long periods of time and most people have other “risk factors” which can complicate the process of linking a specific cancer to a known cause.

We do know this: cancer is a disease of industrial, technological societies. There have always been cancers, but there are strong reasons to believe that many of the cancers, and their accelerating rate, are tied directly to exposure to chemicals, decrease in healthy diets and other industrial age factors. In other words, we are doing it to ourselves.

There have been far too many situations over the last one hundred years where people were told there was “no danger” in what they were being exposed to, only to find out too late that the reassurances were bogus. If there is a method of lessening risk, even if the risk is small, why not use that method? These ideas and suggestions were prepared for family and friends and posted here in the hope of providing information as a public service.

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