Do cellphones cause cancer? Most health authorities do not think so, but a new federal study could reignite the controversy¹ over this issue.

手机致癌吗？大部分健康专家不这么认为，但是美国联邦政府的一项新研究可能重新引发关于这个问题的争论。

The preliminary study, released Friday, found that radiation from cellphones appears to have increased the risks that male rats developed tumors in their brains and hearts. But there are many caveats² and some experts are debunking³ the study.

周五公布的这项初步研究发现，手机辐射似乎增加了雄鼠患上脑部和心脏肿瘤的风险。但有很多需要解释的地方，而且有些专家并不认同这项研究。

Who conducted the study? Are they credible⁴?

谁进行了这项研究？他们可信吗？

The study is from the National Toxicology Program, an interagency group in the Department of Health and Human Services whose job it is to assess the possible risks of chemicals.

这项研究是美国国家毒物管理局(National Toxicology Program)做的，它是美国卫生与公众服务部(Department of Health and Human Services)的一个跨部门机构，其职责是评估化学物质的潜在风险。

How was the study done?

研究是如何进行的？

Rats lived in special chambers⁵ where they were exposed to different levels of radiation of the type emitted by cellphones for nine hours a day, every day. The exposure started before they were born and continued until they were about 2 years old.

大鼠住在特殊的房间里，每天接受九小时不同强度的辐射，辐射类型与手机辐射相同。从出生前一直持续到约2岁大。

What did they find?

他们发现了什么？

About 2 to 3 percent of the male rats exposed to the radiation developed malignant⁶ gliomas, a brain cancer, compared with none in a control group that was not exposed to radiation.

约2%至3%受到辐射的雄鼠患上了恶性胶质瘤——它是一种脑部癌症——而没有受到辐射的对照组没有此类病例。

About 5 to 7 percent of the male rats exposed to the highest level of radiation developed schwannomas in their hearts, compared with none in the control group. Schwannomas are tumors that occur in cells that line the nerves. The authors concluded the brain and heart tumors were “likely caused’’ by the radiation.

受到最高强度辐射的雄鼠有大约5%至7%患上了心脏神经鞘瘤，而对照组中没有此类病例。神经鞘瘤是由周围神经的神经鞘所形成的肿瘤。作者们认为，脑部和心脏肿瘤“可能”是辐射“造成的”。

What about female rats?

那雌鼠呢？

Oddly enough, the incidence of tumors in females was minimal⁷, barely different from the control group. It is not clear why the results would vary between the sexes, which is one reason some experts are questioning the findings.

奇怪的是，雌鼠的肿瘤发病率极低，与对照组几乎没有差别。不同性别出现不同结果的原因不明，这一点也令有些专家对研究结果产生质疑。

What are other caveats?

还有什么需要我们知道的？

Even for males, the differences between particular groups of rats and the control group were not statistically⁸ significant. Another anomaly was that the rats exposed to the radiation lived longer on the whole than animals in the control group. And schwannomas can occur all over the body, not just the heart, but the study did not find increased rates in other organs.

即便就雄鼠而言，某些组与对照组之间的差别从统计学角度讲也不是很明显。还有一个反常现象，受到辐射的大鼠的寿命，总体而言长于对照组。而且，神经鞘瘤可能在全身各处发作，不只是心脏，但是这项研究没有发现其他器官的神经鞘瘤发生比例升高。

Also it was unusual that the control group had zero tumors. In previous studies at the National Toxicology Program, an average of 2 percent of rats in control groups developed gliomas. Had that happened in this study, there would have been virtually no difference between the exposed rats and the controls.

另一个反常情况是，对照组完全没有肿瘤病例。在国家毒物管理局之前的研究中，对照组平均会出现2%的神经胶质瘤。如果同样的情况出现在这项研究中，那受到辐射的大鼠与对照组之间实际上没有差别。

“I am unable to accept the authors’ conclusions,” said one reviewer of the study, Dr. Michael S. Lauer, deputy director for extramural research at the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Lauer, whose comments were in an appendix to the report, said it was likely that the findings represented false positives.

“我无法接受作者们的结论，”这项研究的一位评议人迈克尔·S·劳尔博士(Michael S. Lauer)说。他是国家卫生研究院(National Institutes of Health)的院外研究副主任。劳尔的评审意见出现在这份报告的附录里。他说，这些发现可能是错误判断。

The amounts of radiation that rats were exposed to might be higher than what cellphone users typically experience, though toxicology studies often use higher doses to make sure to detect any effect that might exist.

这些大鼠受到的辐射强度可能高于手机用户通常受到的辐射，不过毒物学研究一般都是使用更高剂量，以确保检测到任何可能存在的影响。

So we can just dismiss this study and go on using our phones?

所以，我们可以不理会这项研究，继续使用手机吗？

Not totally. As the authors of the report write: “Given the extremely large number of people who use wireless⁹ communication devices, even a very small increase in the incidence of disease resulting from exposure to the RFR generated by those devices would have broad implications for public health.” RFR refers to radio-frequency radiation.

并不完全是这样。就像那份报告的作者们写的：“使用无线通讯设备的人数量众多，那些设备产生的射频辐射就算只是轻微提高发病率，也会对公共健康造成广泛影响。”

Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society, issued a statement on Friday that called this study “good science,” and called for further research because the animal research used very high signal strengths.

周五，美国癌症学会(American Cancer Society)的首席医疗官奥蒂斯·布劳利博士(Otis Brawley)发表了一项声明，称这项研究是“优秀科学成果”，倡议进行进一步研究，因为动物研究所用的信号强度很高。

But he said, “The NTP report linking radiofrequency radiation (RFR) to two types of cancer marks a paradigm¹⁰ shift in our understanding of radiation and cancer risk.”

但是他说，“国家毒物管理局的报告将射频辐射与两种癌症联系起来，标志着我们在理解辐射和癌症风险方面出现思考模式的转变。”

Dr. David O. Carpenter, director of the Institute for Health and Environment at the University at Albany, said he thought the study provided backing for the human epidemiological studies that suggested cellphone use was associated with an increased risk of gliomas and acoustic¹¹ neuromas, a type of schwannoma. “I think this is real,’’ he said, suggesting people used wired earpieces to talk on cellphones.

大卫·O·卡彭特博士(David O. Carpenter)是纽约州立大学奥尔巴尼分校(Albany)健康和环境学院(Institute for Health and Environment)的院长。他说，他认为这项研究为人类流行病学的研究提供了支持，表明使用手机与神经胶质瘤及听神经瘤（神经鞘瘤的一种）的风险增加有关。“我觉得这是真的，”他说。他建议人们在接打电话时使用有线耳机。

What have other studies found?

其他研究发现了什么？

Dr. Carpenter’s view is not the prevailing¹² one. Many studies have been conducted, including some very large ones like the Million Women Study in Britain, and a Danish study of more than 350,000 cellphone users. There also were studies examining the effects of these radio waves in animals and cells growing in petri dishes. The results are reassuring¹³. There is no convincing evidence of any link between cellphone use and cancer or any other disease.

卡彭特的观点不是主流观点。之前有过很多研究，包括一些很大规模的研究，比如英国的百万女性研究(Million Women Study)，以及丹麦对逾35万手机用户进行的研究。还有些研究是检验这些无线电波对动物以及在皮氏培养皿中生长的细胞的影响。这些研究的结果令人宽慰。没有令人信服的证据表明，使用手机与癌症或其他疾病之间存在联系。

Also, the incidence of brain cancer in the United States has remained steady since 1992, despite the stark¹⁴ increase in cellphone use.

另外，从1992年至今，美国的脑部癌症发病率始终很稳定，尽管这期间手机使用量急剧上升。

The International Agency for Research on Cancer, part of the World Health Organization, rates cellphone radiation a “possible’’ human carcinogen, based on limited evidence in both people and animals. It gives the same rating to coffee and pickled vegetables.

世界卫生组织(World Health Organization)的国际癌症研究机构(International Agency for Research on Cancer)基于人和动物身上的有限证据，将手机辐射列为“可能”对人类有致癌作用的物质，与咖啡和咸菜属于同一级别。

But don’t we know that radiation causes cancer?

但是，难道我们不知道辐射致癌吗？

Ionizing radiation, the powerful type from nuclear weapons, nuclear power plants and X-ray machines, is strong enough to knock electrons off atoms and damage DNA¹⁵. That can cause cancer. But the radiation from cellphones, called radio-frequency radiation, is nonionizing and not known to damage DNA.

核武器、核电站和X光机产生的强烈的电离辐射足以把电子从原子中释放出来，损害DNA。那会致癌。但手机辐射是射频辐射，不是电离辐射，不会损害DNA。

So what happens now?

接下来会怎样？

The findings released Friday are preliminary and part of a larger study, so more data will be coming out, probably next year. The existing report will also be reviewed further by more experts.

周五公布的发现是初步试验，是一项更大规模研究的一部分，所以会出现更多数据，很可能明年公布。现有的报告也将由更多专家进一步评审。