WTF WHO?

I downloaded the rather extensive list of possible cancer initiators from the WHO. These are items that they have no real data to say either way, or conflicting studies. So what other possibly dangerous items is the cell phone hanging with, according to the WHO?

Caffeine - oops!

Coffee, in addition to the caffeine element

Pickled Vegetables (Oh no! I have some in my kitchen!)

Amaranth (health food peeps beware!)

Areca nuts (not sure what these are)

Gasoline (well, duh)

Carbon Black (it's in everything that's made of black plastic or rubber, like car tires)

Chimney sweeping (glad I stayed in college!)

Chloroform (anybody have an operation before like 1920?)

Cholesterol (hmm)

Just about every food coloring, including the new ones

Diazepam (Valium)

Diesel engine exhaust

Many, many medications

Electric fields (oh brother)

Being a firefighter (burning chemicals I guess)

Hair coloring products

Helicobacter pylori infection (have an ulcer? Take some cancer with that! Two for one!)

Hepatitis A, B, C, and D (I didn't know it went up to D! Whoa. You'd better break up with Pamela Anderson)

High-temperature frying (Buffalo wings!)

Isopropyl alcohol

Leather dust (that's for you, cowboys)

Magenta (not sure if they mean the color? That would be weird)

Magnetic fields, static (I seriously doubt this one too)

Melamine (plastic dishes)

Mineral oil (yeah, that stuff you put on your wooden cutting board)

Naphthalene (ok you mothball sniffers, you know who you are)

Nickel Nitrates/Nitrites (lunch meat, sausages)

Nylon 6 (very common plastic)

Plutonium (ya think? I'd guess they should have real data for this one)

Polystyrene (Styrofoam - I knew Amazon would kill me eventually)

Polypropylene (very common plastic)

Prazepam (Centrax)

Printing inks

Salted fish

Selenium (check your vitamins!)

Working the night shift (seriously?)

Solar radiation (wear your sunscreen...I think this one should have real data too)

Talc body powder

Tannic acid and tannins (holy mother of God! Wine!)

Tea (yep, they're going there)

Urethane (it's in paint)

Vitamin K

Wood dust

Wood smoke (songs around the campfire)

...and about a million other things.

The way the WHO is misusing data (or lack thereof) I think is a big part of why the public is so confused about things like this. They got front page headlines to announce something they have no solid data for either way. Hmpf. I'm not saying many of these things don't cause cancer. Some of the items on their list almost certainly do. But why confuse people when you have no (or inconclusive data)? I mean really, putting cell phones on the same list as plutonium would probably scare the shit out of most people. But all the items on this list have little or no conclusive data. In the case of plutonium, they've probably never done studies on it because everything in its class is capable of the DNA mutations that cause cancer. So you have a two vastly different things, plutonium and cell phones, both with inconclusive data, and you put them together and viola! They are now equal in the eyes of most people. That's terribly misleading.

You could argue "better safe than sorry", but are you ready to give up everything on this list on the basis of no evidence? I'm not.

I like me some pickles!