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What It’s Like to Be Allergic to Wi-Fi
USA Created: 31 Mar 2015
On the Breaking Bad spin-off Better Call Saul, the character Chuck McGill, a lawyer played by Michael McKean, has a rather memorable condition. He frequently wraps himself in a space blanket to protect his body from cell phones or wireless internet, claiming the electromagnetic fields emitted by these devices sicken him. He has — or thinks he has — a case of what’s known as electromagnetic hypersensitivity, or EHS.

This is not a condition most doctors recognize. The Guardian was quick to debunk the supposed science behind EHS, claiming that the condition is overhyped by the media, and that while the symptoms sufferers report may indeed be real, it’s psychological rather than physiological. That sentiment was echoed by George Johnson in the Times, who wrote, “From the perspective of science, the likelihood of the rays somehow causing harm is about as strong as the evidence for ESP.”

While EHS is acknowledged by the World Health Organization, the group notes that its associated symptoms (like dizziness, nausea, heart palpitations, and redness, tingling, and burning sensations on the skin) are not part of any single recognized syndrome. It estimates that EHS affects a few individuals per million, and, drawing on data from self-help groups – states that about 10 percent of cases are deemed “severe.” The WHO is firm in its position that “EHS can be a disabling problem for the affected individual” but it “has no clear diagnostic criteria and there is no scientific basis to link EHS symptoms to EMF exposure.”

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Source: New York Magazine, Alexa Tsoulis-Reay, 29 Mar 2015

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