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Aug. 24, 2007

The state of Alaska and the Alaskan Supreme Court have upheld a decision by the Alaska Workers' Compensation Board awarding an AT&T equipment installer full disability benefits.

The court case was due to his exposure to radio frequency radiation at levels slightly above the FCC's safety limit.

AT&T employee John Orchitt complained of headaches, eye pain and mental slowing following an incident where he was severely exposed to a 6 GHz signal operating at about 90 Watts.

When Orchitt entered the job site, the RF amplifier was supposed to have been turned off, but he soon discovered that the wrong amplifier had been disabled.

According to an EMR Policy Institute, a consumer advocacy group specializing in wireless health issues, Orchitt's MRI after the incident showed, small areas of hypersensitivity in the frontal lobes.

However, Orchitt's RF exposure level was well below the FCC's recognized level of "thermal" harm.

Though the FCC claims there are no scientifically established harmful effects to a person's health when exposed to radio frequency levels below the thermal threshold, the Alaska Worker Compensation Board's decision agrees with medical experts' findings of adverse health effects occurring above the FCC safety limit, but below the so-called thermal threshold.

For its part, AT&T appealed the workers compensation board's decision initially to Alaska's superior court and then to Alaska's Supreme Court.

Alaska's Supreme Court actually upheld the board's original decision, stating "the board has the sole power to determine witness credibility and assign weight to medical testimony. When medical experts disagree about the cause of an employee's injury, we have held that as a general rule, it is undeniably the province of the Board and not this court to decide who to believe and who to distrust."

"This precedent-setting case opens the door for any wireless industry or maintenance worker who has been exposed to antenna arrays on the job site that have not been shut off to file disability claims should they suffer similar cognitive and neurological symptoms," according to the EMR.

By law, U.S. wireless service providers are not required to document compliance with FCC R.F. safety limits by on-site radiation measurements.

"Overall, millions of workers occupy worksites on a daily basis where operating antenna arrays are camouflaged and where no workplace RF safety program is carried out," EMR added.

There are several other health-related lawsuits facing the wireless industry across the U.S., and though the specifics vary, as EMR said in a statement "this case could hold significant financial impact for the wireless industry as a whole."

As is usual in such court cases, AT&T declined to comment on the decision, though an AT&T spokesperson did confirm that "all of AT&T's handsets and wireless towers are within the FCC's limits for RF radiation."

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Source: Wireless Week