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Senator Mark Daly is chairing a global Conference on the Health Effects of Mobile Phones at the UK’s National Academy of Science in London. Senator Daly has long had a personal concern with the adverse health effects of mobile phones and masts after both his aunt and uncle, who lived less than 50 metres from a mobile phone mast in Kerry, both died of cancer within months of each other.

The London Conference is being attended by both sides of the ongoing debate into the health effects of mobile phones, masts and power lines. There are expert contributors from England, the USA, Austria, Russia, Sweden and Italy. The Conference began today, Monday, with an address by Sir William Stewart, Chair of the UK Health Protection Agency.

Over the last twelve months Senator Daly has called on the Irish Government to apply the European Environmental Agency’s “Precautionary Principle” approach to regulating for Irish mobile phones and masts. Speaking in the Seanad on the 8th April this year Daly  urged the Government to “have the highest standards rather than the lowest in terms of emissions for mobile telephone masts.”, he continued, “I sound a word of caution. It took 57 years to prove that tobacco causes lung cancer. We do not have 57 years to wait to prove that mobile telephone masts cause cancer. The Irish people expect us to act in their best interests and to act against any vested interests”.

In Ireland there are now 5.4m mobile phones in circulation for a population of 4.2m. As a nation, we spend 849 minutes every month talking on mobiles. Senator Daly has commended the UK Department of Health’s advice that children under-16 should be “discouraged” from using mobile phones except for emergency calls.

Other parliamentarians attending the Conference include Green Party MEP Dr. Caroline Lucas and MPs, Dr. Ian Gibson, Joe Benton, Phil Willis Andrew Mitchell and Lembit Öpik.