TV broadcast towers and cancer: The end of innocence for radiofrequency exposures

In the minds of radiation and public health workers, nonionizing radiation has been considered separate from ionizing radiation on the premise that its energy content was not sufficient to lead ionization and hence it was not a cancer risk. This premise is no longer acceptable in light of three reports on leukemia risk to populations living near TV broadcast towers. Three articles published in December 1996 and January 1997, reporting epidemiological studies in the United Kingdom and Australia, have changed our perspective. Taken together, they suggest that exposures of residents living near (within 5 km) broadcast facilities may have small increases in leukemia.