The “Teaching, Leading, Learning K-12” podcast is hosted by Dr. Steven Miletto, who has been an educator in Georgia(US) for 33 years. He has served public school families as a history teacher, assistant principal, and high school principal. In 2009, he was the Georgia Principal of the Year and a finalist for NASSP/MetLife National Principal of the Year in 2010. As a teacher he taught US and world history, was a yearbook sponsor, theater sponsor and soccer goalie coach. Additionally, he was the teacher of the year at Southwest DeKalb high school in 1989. Currently, he is the executive director of a regional educational service agency (RESA) in Georgia (US). He is a podcaster, voiceover creator, youtuber, and overall content developer. His focus in education is to help kids achieve their dreams.
In this episode, he talks with our CEO, R Blank, about the health risks of EMF radiation, and how children and schools can utilize technology more safely.
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Andrew Murrata 0:00
I’m Andrew Murata, host of the education leadership and beyond podcast a part of the education Podcast Network just like the show you were listening to now shows on the network or individually owned and opinions expressed may not reflect others find other interesting education podcasts at Edu podcast network.com
Dr. Steven Miletto 0:19
Hey, teaching learning leading k 12 is partnering with the john Maxwell company to bring interviews like Episode 402 with Jason Stapleton and episode four three with Jeff Henderson. And also to make you aware of the awesome leadership event called live to lead coming October 8 2021. to Atlanta, Georgia, go to L to L ATL comm for more information and when you go to checkout, use the code k 12. Get a special discount. See you there. Hey, welcome back, Steve here and today I’m talking with R Blank, who’s the CEO of shield your body whose mission is to make technology safer. Today we are learning about EMF radiation, potential dangers and how to make using technology so much safer. Lots to learn today. Great information. And by the way before you go, it would be so awesome if you went to my website Steven maletto comm slash reviews and left a review for my podcast. Can you do that? That would be so cool. Thanks so much. Enjoy the show. Hey, Steve here and my podcast teaching learning leading k 12 is hosted on pod bean. If you use my affiliate link when you sign up for podcast hosting, you will get one month free. I’ve been on pod bean for the whole existence of my podcast since November of 2013. in that timeframe, I’ve had nonstop service. I’ve had easy access to assistance when I needed help. I’ve been able to upload unlimited pictures and podcast episodes. The dashboard is easy to use in my pod bean community has grown tremendously. Looking at starting a podcast we’ll use my affiliate link to get one month free of hosting. Go to my website at Steven maletto comm slash sponsors can click on the pod bean hosting link to see what plans are offered and choose the one that you like the best. You’ll be glad you did. You know I’ve had the good fortune to connect with several representatives from Kitt caster a podcasting booking agency. They reached out to me on behalf of their clients who want to spread the word about their book, their story, their ideas, their businesses and so much more. Kessler has been such a pleasure to work with and I always enjoy working with their clients. Now kick casters and affiliate partner with teaching learning leading k 12 which is really cool and and I got to ask you, have you been wanting to tell your story on podcasts? podcasts are a great way to grow your personal and business brand. If you’re an expert in your field have a unique story to share or an interesting point of view. It’s time to explore the world of podcasting with kik caster, go to kick caster comm slash t l l k 12. Or go to my web page at Steven maletto comm slash sponsors. Click on the kid caster logo and apply for a special offer for just the Friends of teaching learning leading k 12.
Unknown Speaker 3:02
You are listening to teaching learning leading k 12 a podcast for educators helping you help kids achieve their dreams. And now here’s Steve with this week’s show.
Cut Your Exposure to Harmful EMF – Right Now
Grab your copy of my free guide with 5 ways to start.
Dr. Steven Miletto 3:17
R Blank is the CEO of shield your body whose mission is to make technology safer, with hundreds of 1000s of customers in over 30 countries and having been interviewed on platforms ranging from ABC television to electric since R is an internationally followed expert on issues of emf health and safety. He was inspired to create si B when he co authored the best selling book overpowered with his father, Dr. Martin Blanc, one of the world’s leading EMF scientists, he has degrees from Columbia University and UCLA are thanks for joining me today and say hi to everyone. Hi, everyone. Thank you so much. Dr. Steve. It’s it’s real pleasure to be here. And I really appreciate the opportunity to share this information with your audience. Well, I’m glad that you’re here. And this is scary stuff. Especially because
R Blank 4:00
I try not to make it scary. But yeah, it can be I know that. Yeah. When people first learned about it, it can certainly be an intimidating topic. And you know, because this stuff is everywhere. All right, before we dive into the topic, let’s talk about you. I read that you co created the first video in quarter for flash sold to Google. Could you tell tell us what that is? Or was? Oh, sure. Yeah, I mean, that feels like more than a lifetime ago. But yeah, yeah. So you know, flashback about about 2021 years, two decades.
The i was i was so out of college, I became a web developer. And at the time, especially kids today just can’t appreciate it at the time. The web was very limited in terms of what you could do with it. And web pages were ugly and boring. And there was no real way to put video inside of a webpage. I don’t know if you remember things like real player. And you know, so we would launch in an external app. And so what we did there was this technology called flash, which at the time was created by Macromedia, which later became part of Adobe. And flash allowed all of these cool things to run inside of a browser. And, you know, over time, it became known for animations and games, but it allowed for all sorts of experiences. And we figured, wouldn’t it be cool if you could deliver video inside a flash, which means you could put it inside of a browser? And so that’s what we created was the first encoder. So you could turn a video into a Flash file and just play it inside of a browser. And so that’s, that’s what that was. That’s very cool. Because I,
Dr. Steven Miletto 5:35
I remember that timeframe very well. And, and yeah, that was a big deal when that happened. So that’s neat. That made that happen. That’s cool. So that’s when I saw that I was like, Oh, dude, I gotta ask this question here. So is that just kind of propelled us a lot further along? And I love that. So good stuff.
R Blank 5:55
Thank you.
Dr. Steven Miletto 5:56
So let’s shift into our topic. Today, we’re going to focus on making the use of technology safer. And in order to do that, we need to explain what EMF radiation is. Can you do that for us? Sure.
R Blank 6:07
Yeah. So EMF stands for electromagnetic field, sometimes also called electromagnetic radiation, or EMR. And it’s a form of energy that’s created by as the name suggests electricity and magnetism. Now there’s a form of emf that everyone knows. And that’s called visible light, like we get from the sun, the sun is a form of emf. And with a few exceptions, it’s really the only form of emf that humanity and all life on Earth was exposed to, for billions of years, until about the year 1850, when Thomas Edison created the light bulb, and the light bulb then became a source of emf. And then they created a power grid to power the light bulbs, and those that became a source of emf. And then once the power grid was in place, other companies started making all these cool appliances that you could use in your kitchen in your home, and those all became sources of emf, then a little bit later, we have people discovering that you can actually send communications wirelessly, and using EMF and so we had the invention of radio. And then we had the invention of radar and the invention of television. And all of these wireless communication technologies work by transmitting EMF, so emitting more EMF. So again, so just to contextualize for people, until about 160 170 years ago, there was no human made EMF in our environment. And since then, we’ve been on this path of exponential growth in terms of the number of sources of this stuff in our environment. Now, I would also throw in here, not to complicate it, but there’s some other forms of emf that people might be aware of. And these have a lot of energy, more energy than visible light than the sun. And these are things called like ultraviolet, and x rays, and gamma rays. And everyone has always known that this stuff is dangerous, even in really, really small doses. So that’s why when you go to the dentist office, and you have to get x rays done, they put a lead coat on you and the technician hoofs it out of the room, because you need as little of this stuff as possible, because it is just super dangerous, even in tiny, tiny doses, when you’re talking about the forms of emf with less energy than the sun than visible light, which is the kind that we’re talking about here, the human made stuff, it was long thought this stuff was safe, that we could just blank it ourselves in this and it was fine. But a growing body of very high quality scientific research now extending back decades, including work that that my father did, shows that that assumption was incorrect, that exposure to this type of emf is harmful to humans and to all living things.
Dr. Steven Miletto 8:59
Gotcha. That’s a it’s scary stuff. You know, you’ve it just as a side note, I’m a former officer in the army, and spent most of my time in the National Guard and Reserves and in communications and so I sat in shelters with, with big antennas outside and did microwave communications for a while and then multi channel and, you know, surrounded by all this equipment that’s just humming right along and I can only imagine all this stuff it was creating. But interesting media, you know, and in our world today, I mean, this stuff. When I was dealing with all that it was super high tech and you know, felt like you were in a James Bond movie or something like this. And you know, it’s now vintage.
R Blank 9:45
Yeah, well, I remember when I got my first cell phone, I think it was 1999 I think is when I got and I thought it was so cool. Like I could just talk to people from anywhere. I could be in the middle of the street. I could be in the middle of a friend’s apartment. I could be out on a walk. And I and I remember thing. I mean, I already knew because of my father’s work that you know, use this in small doses, but it was still just mind blowing to me that I could do that. So I totally get the the whole sort of James Bond, Dick Tracy video watch sort of vibe that you were getting from that?
Dr. Steven Miletto 10:16
Oh, yeah. And it’s, you know, it’s funny, it’s like when all that stuff was coming out the size of the phones, what were even more impressive as more people were getting them but it the, you know, it’s, it’s interesting, because we surrounded ourselves by so much more technology that’s producing, you know, that that’s, you know, producing waves and such, which is interesting. So, let’s, let’s talk a little bit about EMF and a human’s immune system. I mean, how does radiation exposure, exposure harm your health? Sure, well,
R Blank 10:49
so those are two related but different quotes. So on the first on the question of the immune system, there’s a fair amount of research into this, I can I can tell you about one. So there’s a doctor named Ali Johansen. And in 2009, he published a review of multiple studies that he had, he had repeated, looked over. And he found that the consensus was that exposure to this type of radiation had the same impact on your immune system as taking immunosuppressive drugs. So immunosuppressive drugs are the types of drugs that you need to take when you need your body to your body’s immune system to be suppressed to not work as well. And again, so his what he had found is that multiple papers have found that this type of emf exposure, leads to immunosuppression, the same type of result that you get from taking those drugs, which, which is obviously not not not an optimal condition for our bodies. Most definitely, most definitely. So the
Dr. Steven Miletto 11:52
you know, when when we talk about this, and by the way, before we go any further, I want to make sure that I mentioned that, do you help your father write a book called overpowered the dangers of electromagnetic radiation? And what you can do about it? Can you talk a little bit about that book, what what it focuses on, but then also about the role that you played in, in helping your father and just a little bit about? You know, was that kind of cool, right, in the book when your father?
R Blank 12:16
Yeah, sure. Well, yeah, to answer your last question. First, it was a, you know, on the personal level, because he’s, he passed away, just about three years ago. Now. So and we wrote the book in 2012. So we got to spend, we weren’t face to face, we were living in different places at the time, but got to spend quite a lot of quality time together there towards the end of his life. But also from just from the perspective of Vmf. It was, as I mentioned before, you know, I grew up obviously grew up with him. And I always kind of knew what he did. And I knew why we never had a microwave oven in the house. And I knew when I got a cell phone, to use it as little as possible, and to keep it away from my head. And I knew stuff like that, but I didn’t really understand what the work he was doing. And so writing the book with him, was an amazing opportunity to get this kind of Crash Course, in EMF Health Science from one of the world’s leading researchers. And so that is really what the focus of the book is, is talking about, you know, because my father published a lot of a lot of studies, a lot of articles, but they were always aimed at other academics, and sometimes towards activists. And it was never really for general consumption. And so the purpose of the book was to communicate to as broad an audience as possible, what the science actually says about the health effects of exposure to EMF radiation, what our modern devices are, are doing to our health. And again, the goal was to communicate this to as broad an audience as possible. I had a lot of by that point, I had a fair amount of experience. Speaking public speaking, I’d written a book, I was teaching on the engineering faculty at University of Southern California. And so he asked me for help to try to make the book and the message as accessible as possible to people. And so the book goes into depth about what the science actually says is, you know, everyone is worried about cancer. So that’s, that’s a big, you know, that that’s a focus of the book, but there’s a lot more affect health effects than just cancer. What the science shows is that exposure to EMF essentially impacts or can impact every biological system in our body. So it’s not like it just causes cancer or just attacks the brain. We see, you know, other serious outcomes, including infertility and miscarriage, but we also see a whole spectrum all the way down to what we might consider to be less severe conditions like anxiety and sleep disruption. And this is because the science is increasingly clear and very strong. The EMF exposure to this type of energy impacts almost every system in our body. But also, like I’ve said a couple times, all living things. So we see, we see it in, in honeybees, where sight, there’s a body of science showing that this could be a contributing factor to colony collapse disorder. We see it in birds, where migratory patterns are being disrupted. We see it in trees, where trees that are exposed to this sort of this sort of radiation. So in the same forest trees that are more exposed to nearby towers are weaker. They don’t, they don’t grow as much we see this in basically all living things. Gotcha.
Dr. Steven Miletto 15:46
Gotcha. I appreciate that. That, you know, it’s just as a side note that that I personally think that would have been really cool if I’d had a chance with my father to write some sort of book. And. And that’s, that’s, that’s neat. So I thank you for sharing the details about that, which I think is neat, as well as then the message of the book. And that’s cool, because, you know, one of the things that I thought was fascinating is that you were helping and helping him make it that message, like you said, that is easier to be understood by non academics and non researchers. So
R Blank 16:17
yeah, thank you. And, yeah, one other thing I should say about the book, it goes a lot into the science, obviously heavily into the science because he was a scientist. But there’s also content that really explains how the science is being corrupted and challenged by big business. And we use the example of, of the tobacco playbook and illustrate how that has been playing out over the past few decades in the wireless industry, in particular with the wireless industry, and how they fund studies that are designed to produce certain results that are designed to muddy the waters, how they channel funding in certain ways to get certain outcomes. And that part, I think, is also important for people to to understand because, you know, you hear people like me say the science is very strong, the science is very strong, that this stuff is bioactive. And then you’ll turn on the news. And you’ll hear some wireless industries spokesman saying, well, there’s a debate, the jury’s still out. There’s science that says both things. And the fact is, the reason that is the case is because a lot of the science is unfortunately corrupted. But that is how science works. And so the book goes into detail to try to explain that to people as well. That’s
Dr. Steven Miletto 17:30
a that’s interesting. And I got a question coming up that I got to fit right with that and cell phones. But before we get to that, sure, before we get to that I want to is this that’s a scary thing, if someone is manipulating the information that we’re getting, because it is I mean, these are in our world, and it’s getting more so. And yeah, there’s, there’s, there’s so many people with you know, we got a lot of people that definitely grew up on science fiction. And so we got the other Cyborg world coming to us almost with the idea of attaching things to us. And, you know, even the there for a while when you had the kind of like that bombardment of people having the little ear ear attachment that they were they wore around a lot. That’s pretty close to, you know, right there at your school. I Yeah, well,
R Blank 18:16
and now these days, we have airpots. So people are walking around with two of them in, you know, one in each year. And it’s not just business people anymore. It’s it’s increasingly everyone. And, and I assume we’re going to talk a little bit more about this. This is even more concerning for children, because children are more vulnerable to the to damage from these types of forces.
Dr. Steven Miletto 18:38
Most definitely no matter of fact, that’s my, that’s where I’m going next. I mean, yes. So technology is all around us. And our children, typically adults and children have access to and use laptops, Chromebooks, tablets, phones, and so much more. And, and I totally forgot about the, you know, the, the, the EarPods Thank you, you know, it’s because that’s a huge thing right now. And you can tell I’m vintage in that area, too, because I still have cords I guess funny looks from people is like yet the Okay, fine, you know, they came with a phone a long time ago, and I even had that little dongle now so that I can still make those work. So but, you know, let’s talk about what types of dangerous pose by using these devices daily. I mean, because even, you know, even I mean, I’m, I’m an educator for 33 years, I mean, and you know, more and more, it’s a part of our world and you think about this, you know, the pandemic causing us to be in the virtual world even more so, you know, we get more electronics right there more time with it because of the virtual world up. Tell me what, what some of this impact is that it might have on children? Hey, do you need help in becoming more effective at teaching virtual classes? Well, nvta the national virtual teaching Association has a semester program that is college accredited and designed to help you become more successful as a virtual teacher. A few of the topics that we’ll be focused on are instead Seeing relationships in the virtual environment, virtual instruction best practices, differentiation in the virtual classroom and managing virtual resources, among others. nvta is an affiliate partner with teaching learning leading k 12. And there’s so much there to help you be successful in the virtual classroom. Take a look, go to my website, Steven letter.com. Slash sponsors, find the nvta logo and click on it to take you to their website. Happy learning.
R Blank 20:26
Sure, well, I mean, so I’ve already I think, at least given a top level of what the impact is just on on humans. And we see, like I say, outcomes ranging on the less severe side, from things like anxiety and depression and mood disorder. Also, again, less on the less severe but more of a physical symptom, we see headaches, tinnitus, other other Phantom sensations. And then again, going up the scale, we have, not just not just brain tumors, which is again, I think the type of cancer that’s most closely linked in people’s minds to this type of stuff. But we see multiple types of cancer. So it’s brain tumors, it’s breast cancer, it’s colorectal cancer, it’s thyroid cancer, and we mentioned immune disorders. There. We mentioned pregnancy, there’s infertility, there’s a very strong body of science, showing that exposure to this type of radiation is a contributing significant contributing factor to male infertility. But there’s also birth defects. So they there’s a study, just as an example,
children whose mothers had a high exposure in utero had a more than 3.5 fold increased rate of asthma, so that that’s when you know, the child, the child was exposed in utero, but the the health effect manifests later in life. And you see that with asthma, you see that with ADHD. So I could go on and on as I think I’m conveying there, it’s just a very broad spectrum of health effects that that can manifest as a result of these exposures. And before I because I do want to answer the rest of the of the, the meat of your question, but you know, people have this sort of bias, where if you’re using something, and it doesn’t hurt you right away, like it doesn’t burn you, it doesn’t, it doesn’t give you a disease right away, it doesn’t, you know, it doesn’t cause an immediate visible harm, that somehow it’s safe. But a lot of these things take time. There’s certain conditions like the male infertility, that’s actually one that manifests very quickly. But other of these can take months, or years, or in the case of tumors decades to form. And so it’s easier for people to be less concerned to be less worried to disassociate the result from the source the cause. Now, when it comes to children, children have all of the same health risks in terms of the the the diseases and negative health outcomes that can can result. The issue with children is that they are far more vulnerable to damage from this exposure, just like children are far more vulnerable to damage from many different types of toxins. And there’s a few reasons I mean, children, I’m sure you’re well aware of this, based on your experience, children look like little humans, but they’re actually different than than adults, right. And so their physiologies are different, they are growing at a much more rapid rate. So any damage that occurs to them to their DNA, or to any biological systems, it will spread in their bodies more rapidly, because they are growing so much more. They are there, their brains are smaller, right, so that means the same amount of radiation that might go one inch into the skull, it’s much a much greater percentage of the child’s brain than it would an adult children’s skulls are thinner. So that means that you know, because the skull is formed something it’s not a perfect shield, but it shields some of this radiation, when the skull is thinner, you have less of this natural shielding. And then of course, you have the fact that children are younger, which means that any damage that results, they are going to have to live with the impact for much, much longer than you or I would. And you take these factors. And there’s some other ones too. For instance, children’s brains have higher water content, which makes them more conductive to spreading this type of radiation within there. But you take all of the factors like this, and children are just much more vulnerable to damage from exposure. And again, they have to live much, much longer, hopefully much, much longer with whatever results they they experience. And so that’s why children I don’t actually have children, but I am more much more concerned. about the health of children from this, then then for us, because, again, there’s there’s also this kind of time bias, where I mean, you and I know that things changed over the past 20 years over the past 30 years, and so forth. But at the same time, we don’t fully appreciate how much more radiation, children are exposed to now than when we were that age, and they are going to be continuing to be exposed to this stuff. And so just because we might have gotten to a certain age, and we feel okay, does not mean that’s gonna be the same case for these children who have just vastly hired, I mean, Wi Fi didn’t exist when I was in elementary school, cell phones existed, but basically, no one had them. I mean, there was none of this stuff around. And now you go into an elementary school, and you’re surrounded by Wi Fi. You many people have cell phones, this technology, many people have Bluetooth devices. And so the exposure levels in schools now are, I mean, I’d say they’re orders of magnitude higher than when when we were kids, but they didn’t even really exist when we were kids. So VR is infinitely greater today,
Dr. Steven Miletto 26:15
very much. So if you look at someone like me, I mean, I went to schools in Florida that had the time I was there, and I don’t know how I how I would deal with this today. But we didn’t have air conditioning. So we had a windows open and they claimed these whole house type fans would he kept the window open about this far, it would end the door, it would just pull this air through there and make you feel fine. I don’t think I can survive it today. But the the, you know, the technology that you had was, you know, stuff that they kept in the library, they checked out like the filmstrip projects her and, and the, the the overhead, the overhead, stuff like that. And now it’s way beyond any of that stuff. Because in and then simply, you know, the older you get, then the ability to bring in your phones and be able to use phones and stuff like that for different projects, because all the different apps and the power of apps and things like that. So, you know, so let’s use this to kind of shift into something that is there that can impact children as well. But as you see it all over the place, which is I’m talking about cell phone addiction and EMF. So let’s shift to this. The way people are addicted to their phones. I mean, how’s that impacting impact? And
R Blank 27:31
so this is, this is a really serious issue. In fact, cell phone addiction is not well, let me say so there’s this broad issue of tech addiction, cell phone addiction as part of that. Another aspect of that is video game addiction. And that’s actually recognized by the World Health Organization. Now, as a disorder, unfortunately, cell phone addiction is does not have that same level of recognition. And I’m not I don’t have these stats on hand, memorized, unfortunately. But there’s you can look at any number of different studies conducted over the past six years in terms of hours of use. And I mean, children are spending hours and hours and hours every day on screens, and I’m talking about outside of school before you even get into school. And when you are addicted to these, and they’re being engineered to be addicted. That’s something that I think really parents and educators need to appreciate, certainly regulators should start appreciating this. But they are being engineered to be addictive. They are being engineered to keep you go back checking, just I get a new notification, did my feed refresh it but I wonder what so and so is doing. And they’re they’re pinging you, and they’re sending messages to your feed in ways to trigger these dopamine mechanisms that just keep people coming back and coming back and coming back when they might not even otherwise care to use the device. And each time they’re using these devices, they’re getting exposed to more and more of this radiation. And I think that so the the the, the fact, it’s hard when you’re an EMF health advocate, you can’t tackle everything. And there’s enough to talk about it’s complex enough just on the EMF side in terms of what this stuff is doing to our bodies, that it can be hard to give the correct amount of attention to this issue of tech addiction. But it is it is really a serious issue. And it is fueling more and more exposures. even outside of what we were just talking about outside of schools just just by doing your homework. So yeah, I’m really worried about tech protection.
Dr. Steven Miletto 29:50
Interesting. The you know, because it is I got to do is now that we’re kind of coming out of the pandemic a little bit you know, get more restaurants opening some of this news. You see You know, even before the pandemic, I mean, you, you go to a restaurant, and you’ll see an entire family, with their phone, and they’re looking at their phones. And it’s like, why even at dinner? I mean, just like, I’m not sure, you know, anybody else is there and, you know, and the different ways that this, you know, just the idea of how, you know, I got to check to see if somebody updated me if I guess, check to see if anybody followed me, I got to check to see, you know, what this little ping was all about, and all that sort of stuff. And, and it just makes it so much. You know, it’s funny, I mean, just part of our world with email, if you just use email or texting alone, in work world, there are people who will say, Hey, I texted you, I didn’t hear back from you. And you go, and you look, and the text was set, like, you know, 20 minutes ago, it’s like, what the heck, man? I’m sorry, I, you know, and it shows itself through that type of world to where it you know, it just, I sent it, therefore, you must reply
R Blank 31:03
immediately, potations. And demands are certainly have certainly shifted, just based around people’s usage of technology. And, I mean, when you’re talking about something like cell phone addiction, you know, we’re talking here about EMF health effects. So that’s how I’m gonna approach it. But what it does to just cognitive abilities overall, and attention spans and the the drains and pressures it puts on performance and work performance and social integration. I mean, tech addiction has way more implications than just EMF exposure. And I think that’s what you were really showing there. It’s a great example. And it’s a really serious issue.
Dr. Steven Miletto 31:41
It really is just just as a side note, because I know this isn’t really our, our topic. But it’s funny, because several years ago, when I was a high school principal, I had a, I had so many different places where people could leave me messages. And I’m like, that’s not good, because I’m not gonna check in the main one. So, you know, and I’d read an article that said, there’s ways to get that under control. First of all, go find those different places and find the main one that your bosses need to have, do that one, and then and then send other people to other places. And so I did that, which eliminated my my work phone and stuff like this. Instead, this main area where I knew someone’s going to get it, my, my administrative assistant would would pick those up and stuff like that and say, Hey, we need to get you on the phone with this. My boss said, Hey, you didn’t set up your email on your cell phone. I said, Well, no, actually, I did. But I read this article. And he said, No, you need to set that up immediately. And I said, what the article, he said, I don’t care about the article. And it was funny, because in the same day, I got I got another, you know, two bosses above him. Got that same notification to me. And I was like, Oh, my gosh, so you know, it’s funny. Because even our work world, you know, it’s there’s the pressures to, you know, have that by your side. So that, you know, back with the blackberries, you know, they call it crackberry. Yeah, it’s gone. Way beyond all that. And I kind of wanted to use this to kind of shift into I mean, one of the things you talked about earlier, is this, there’s one or we could talk a little bit more, but where safety regulations maybe aren’t really designed to protect us, and I was wonder if you could talk about that with cell phones. Boom titanium rings found on the web at boon rings calm is an affiliate partner of teaching learning leading k 12. And I’m also a customer I have this really cool ring that’s got these carved pistons and in stores in it, I love it. They make rings of titanium that are carved laser cut and engraved as well as they have in laser many types of materials like meteorite, acrylic, wood, carbon fiber, and so many other types. They also have special collections that are incredible designs. One of the top sellers are the gamer rings, the steel series, and the blacks are conium. As a note, they also make earrings, pendants, cufflinks, and for you musicians, they make cool trumpet mouthpieces love it, go to boon rings calm and at checkout, use my code, capital T, capital L, capital L Kappa K, number 12. And you’ll get 10% off your purchase. So go check them out. I love my ring. And I know that you will love yours.
R Blank 34:08
Sure. So I mean, this is a rich topic. I could I could spend an hour just talking about this. I won’t Don’t worry. So so there’s so there’s a few aspects to this. So one is, as I mentioned, we’re exposed to EMF radiation from all sorts of sources. I mean, cell phones are a big focus. But we’re exposed to EMF from powerlines were exposed to EMF from our electrical wiring in our own home in the United States. None of that is regulated. So there is no limits on how much EMF you can be exposed to from from the power line outside your house. That’s so that’s has no regulation at all. So huge areas of our exposures in the United States are not regulated. Now. When we get into something like cell phones, that people think that it’s regulated because they sort of pretend that it’s regulated and the way it’s quote unquote regulated is with this measurement called SAR. I don’t know if you’ve heard of SAR? No, I have a dance. Yeah, it stands for specific absorption rate. So what that means is they measure how much radiation, if you’re using a phone, how much radiation Will you absorb from that device? Right? So they they they limited at at something like 1.6 milliwatts per, you know, per kilogram, something I have to look at it’s it’s 1.6, I forget the specific unit. But that that’s irrelevant, because so there’s this limit that’s established by the government, and the cell phones all, quote, unquote, meet that limit. So they’re all less than that. But who tests for that limit, who actually test to say the cell phone is emitting less radiation than is legally allowed? And the you know, people will think it’s the government, they’ll think it’s the FCC, because that’s who set this this regulatory limit. But that is not true. Because the the, the entity who tests is actually the company that made the cell phone. So they contract their own testing, to say, Hey, you know what, we’re safe. And then they submit that report to the government. But the government never tests. And so you get these products on the market, just based on basically on the honor system. Now, and you as an educator know what that what acceptable to Yes. So you have an example, a few years ago, in France, the government actually did test 300, some different models of phones. And they found that 90% of them admitted more radiation than the company said they did, several of them emitted more radiation than were legally allowed. And were pulled from the market, they were recalled. In the US, we haven’t had any government effort like that. But we have had independent. So there was a newspaper in Chicago, that tested one model of the iPhone, and found that it emitted much more radiation than then the apple manual set than the than the paperwork set. And so you have multiple examples from around the world that really clearly show that these phones, many of them emit more radiation than, than they say they do. And then that laws permit. But it goes even beyond that, because and I should say, these, these legal limits that the phones need to be under they’re they’re 25 years old, they were set in the 1996 telecom bill. And the science that we now know, has grown significantly since then, and shows that so that the limits that exist aren’t even sufficient. What I’m talking about is let’s pretend that those limits are sufficient. Here’s how they’re still not safe for us, because the companies circumvent by testing on their own. Another example is I mentioned I mentioned this unit of measurement is called SAR specific absorption rate. And it’s supposed to tell you how much radiation you absorb from a phone. The problem is, it doesn’t actually tell you how much radiation you absorb from a phone. It measures how much radiation a dummy called Sam, as it were, a there’s a certain style of dummy that they use to measure this. And that dummy emulates a six foot tall, 220 pound man. And most of humanity is smaller than a six foot tall, 220 pound man. So that means most of humanity will absorb more radiation than the dummy does. In the tests. There are pretend, again, going back to our earlier topic, children are much, much smaller than a six foot tall, 220 pound man, and they are going to absorb much, much more radiation than then the test would show. And I’d say the final again, I could go on and on about this subject. But the final point I will hit
is that these regulations are designed to protect you from a single source. Right. So you’re not supposed to have so much you can’t have so much radiation from this one source that’s harmful. But as we’ve been talking about, over and over again, today, we are exposed to radiation from multiple sources, sometimes dozens, sometimes hundreds at the same time. These regulators there’s no set of regulations that are designed to protect us from how much our cumulative exposure to emf is. And it’s the cumulative exposure that really dictates our health risk. Because it’s not just let me say this another way. These regulations are written in such a way that talking on your phone for 15 seconds, once has the same potential health risks as talking on your phone every day for three hours for 20 Yours well, and we know that that’s the those are not equivalent scenarios that your risk, your health risk is going to be much, much higher over that, you know, talking for multiple hours a day over decades rather than 115. Second Call, but this goes back to what I was talking about earlier in terms of the immediate results, you know, people, the, if something isn’t causing you immediate visible damage, they think it’s safe. That’s what these regulations are designed to protect, they’re basically designed to protect you from getting burned by your phone. And that isn’t enough to protect our health.
Dr. Steven Miletto 40:33
That’s, that’s just so important to know that because you, first of all, just the, the concept of my own world, I mean, yeah, what, you know, it didn’t impact me right away. So therefore, it’s not harmful. You see that all the time. And it’s, you know, it’s, that’s a scary sort of world, when you think about the different places and how much time you might spend in those, those worlds with that EMF being emitted around you. I mean, because I mean, I hate to say this, because you know, right now, I mean, I got, I got headphones on, I’m talking into a powered microphone, I got all I got a laptop in front of me at powered studio monitors next to me. It’s like, yeah, I’m doing good. My lights, you know?
R Blank 41:22
Yeah, well, you know, I just want to emphasize, and maybe we’ll get to this a little bit more as well. But, you know, we’re going to be exposed to this stuff. You know, it’s not like you, because once you become aware that the science exists, and what the science says, The tendency for a lot of people is to get scared to get worried to get terrified. And that is not. That’s not what, that’s not what a good reaction is, because a, you’re not going to be making good decisions from that perspective. But be, you know, we have to realize that we’re going to be I mean, unless you’re going to be a hermit in the middle of the Sahara Desert, you’re going to have these exposures. And, you know, so the goal of me sharing this knowledge is not to terrify people, and once people will become aware of their goal should not be like, ah, how do I get rid of this? The goal should be I am now aware of this, and what can I do to reduce my exposures, because reducing my exposures will reduce my health risks from from from from EMF.
Dr. Steven Miletto 42:21
Awesome. So that’s a great segue into where I’m going next, which is, is simply, you know, let’s talk about how you make our life living with technology safer. And, and let’s use that to kind of slide into you tell us a little bit about shield your body? Sure. So,
R Blank 42:41
okay. There are these two key rules, right, they came from my father, but I call them the two key rules of emf protection. And they are, minimize and maximize. So make it really easy to remember, minimize and maximize. Number one is minimize your use of emf technology. And number two is maximize the distance between you and the tech. So I want to go into just a little bit of depth here on each one. And I’m just going to give examples here. But there, once you learn these two rules, you’ll start thinking and realizing ways that you can implement them multiple different ways that you can implement them in your lives. So minimizing years, this one is pretty obvious when you think about it, right? The less you use EMF emitting tech, the less EMF you’re going to be exposed to. And this does not mean giving up your phones. I know sometimes people you know, people think what am I? They learn about this stuff. And they say, What am I going to do give up my phone, I’m like, No, you don’t have to, because you can use some of this tech less. So for instance, a really good example of this is turning off Wi Fi at night. Now ideally, the optimal solution to for this right is you get rid of Wi Fi, and you replace your home network with Ethernet, like the type of networks we used to have 20 years ago. But a lot of people aren’t willing to do that it’s expensive, it’s difficult to can limit the devices that you’re using and where you’re using them. So a lot of people want to keep their Wi Fi. But that doesn’t mean you have to keep it running at night, because a lot of us keep the Wi Fi on at night. But we’re not even using it. And so that is, you know, on average eight hours of exposure to this relatively powerful source of emf in our homes. And we can use airplane mode, when you’re not using it when you use airplane mode, you’re essentially cutting off the EMF emissions from that device. So those are examples of ways that you can cut back on the existing tech and really make a big difference in your personal exposure. Beyond that, I would say you know, we’re only addicted to the tech that we have and use, but they keep releasing new tech. Yes, no new things that are that are smart that were never smart before and I One of the strongest messages I’m trying to focus on these days is not to upgrade something to being smart, if you don’t need it to be smart, because the companies are trying to sell us, you know, smart fridges, and smart alarm systems and smart locks and smart thermostats, smart kitty litter boxes, there is even I kid you not a smart tampon company, okay. And so when I say minimize your use, I mean, I am saying yes, minimize your use of your phone. But also I’m saying, you know what, don’t get that new smart tech unless you really, really need it. Because I am not a Luddite. I, as you covered earlier, in this interview, I had a 20 year career in software development, I was around high tech, I was in California, you know, I am not a Luddite. I like, I find real value in technology. And I appreciate what it’s done for society and us as individuals, our economy, our culture, it’s, it’s amazing what we can do with tech. But that doesn’t
mean everything needs to be smart. And what I advocate that people engage in is a process where you it really is cost benefit. So if there’s a new device that has some cool smart function, you know, engage with this mindfully, think to yourself, do I really get value out of upgrading my device x to be a smart x? Or, or am I just kind of thinking about it, because it’s cool, because Apple made it and Apple products are cool, or, you know, go through engage in this process mindfully. If there’s a smart piece of smart tech that really adds value to your life, then you know, by all means, go for it. don’t overuse it, but get it but don’t just buy smart tech, because it’s cool, it’s available because your friends have it or what have you. So that’s rule number one, which is minimize Rule number two is maximize maximizing the distance, whereas rule one is sort of intuitive. Rule two may come as a surprise to people. And so the rule, again, is to maximize the distance between the EMF attacking your body when you’re using it. And the reason this is so powerful, is because the power of emf diminishes exponentially with distance. So if you double the distance between let’s use the example of a phone, if you have the phone an inch away from your body, versus two inches away from your body, when you’ve doubled the distance, you’ve cut the power of that exposure by 75%. So the distance makes a huge difference in your exposure. And this is why it’s so important not to carry your phone in your pocket, the you know, with all of the sources of emf in our world, you know, it can be hard to even fathom that that phone in your pocket, could well be your biggest personal source of your biggest personal exposure. Because when it’s in your pocket, it’s right up against your body, and you’re getting a full dose out of this device. And it’s also important for people to realize a lot of these cell phone companies tell you in the manual, not to carry it in your pocket, they use different words they say must be maintained, you know, five centimeters, 10 centimeters away from the they don’t say don’t carry it in your pocket. But based on what they’re saying in the manual, they’re saying don’t carry it in your pocket. They’re also saying don’t hold it up against your head, which to me, it’s it’s almost criminal because they design these products to be held up against your head. And then they put a little disclaimer in there, you know, don’t write Nice, very nice.
So that’s why it’s so important not to carry your phone in your pocket. That’s why using Bluetooth headsets brings such high risk because they’re they’re right there on your body. And they’re they’re near much closer to your brain, then then your phone in your pocket is and they’re at a part of your head where there’s no skull, protecting as a natural shields between the bluetooth headset and your brain. So any piece of tech like that, like that that’s designed in a way where you could use it on your body. Don’t keep it as far away from your body as possible. Other examples are not using your laptop on your lap, there’s a there’s a set of Dell laptops, and they actually market them, you know, other companies have changed the name to notebook. Dell still markets them as laptops. But if you read the manual, it tells you to keep it seven inches away from your lap. And so not using your laptop on your lap, keeping the Wi Fi router as far away in your house as possible from where you and your family spend your time. These are all examples of ways that you can maximize distance. And these two key rules can make a really big difference in your personal exposure. And so it’s even as you know, there’s more cell towers going up more neighbors have Wi Fi networks. They’re all of these sources in your life that are seemingly outside of your control. It’s what you do with the tech that is closest to your body and what your relationship is with the technology in your life. That can have a huge impact. On your personal exposure, and that is all in your control. So those are the two key rules of emf protection, then you asked about my company shield your body. And a lot of what we do is is this type of education. But we also, as you know, we make EMF protection products. And so I said the two key rules are the best way to protect yourself that minimize and maximize. Beyond that, you can if you want additional level of protection, I call EMF protection products, the second line of defense. So I tell people, for example, not to carry their phones in their pockets. But there are some people who either need to for their jobs or just want to, they’re not going to give it up. It’s not you know, convenient, particularly for men, many of whom don’t carry around extra bags. You know, it’s not, there’s there’s no other convenient way for them to carry their phones. So that’s why we make for example, the phone pouch, which is shield your body calm, it’s, it’s now 555 years, that product is now five years old, it’s my most popular product, it’s been knocked off by a couple of companies, but they’re not just high quality in my opinion. But that makes it safer to carry your phone, right, so it’s a pouch that you put your phone in, and then you put the pouch on your belt, you’re in your pocket, the rear of the pouch is shielded with an EMF shielding material. And the front is not shielded. So when you’re carrying your phone in the pouch, the shielded side is between your phone and your body. So it’s the flex the phone’s radiation away from your body, while still allowing your phone to communicate. Another example of a product I make that I tell people not to use their laptops in their lab. But there are some people who still do. For instance, if they use their laptops while they’re commuting to work. Or if they’re you increasingly in the past year when people were working at home, you know, they didn’t have a desk they had. So I make a laptop pad. And that is, again, another form of emf shielding, you put the pad on your lap and then the laptop on the pack. And it deflects a bunch of the radiation away from your body. So it makes it safer. So both of those are examples where the the two key rules I mentioned earlier are the best type of emf protection, and my products would be a second line of defense. Now I also make a set of products that are really designed more to protect you from sources of emf outside of your control. So you know, you can keep your phone out of your pocket, you can keep your laptop off your lap, you can’t move your neighbor’s Wi Fi networks, you can’t move the nearby cell towers. And so we have, for instance, EMF apparel, we have men’s underwear, we have a neck Gator, which is like a neck tube that you can wear as a scarf or a hat. We have a baby blanket and a baby beanie. We also have a bed canopy, which which you can mount around your bed and really create a sort of safe and close space while you sleep again, helping to protect you from all of these sources that are outside of your media control. So that’s that’s that that that’s the type of product that my company makes.
Dr. Steven Miletto 53:06
Awesome. Awesome. So before we close if someone wanted to connect with you and learn more, where we send them
R Blank 53:13
so yeah, please visit shield your body comm slash te Ll that’s shield your body all one word calm slash te Ll there I have a free guide, with the top five ways that people can reduce their exposure to EMF radiation for free immediately without buying a single thing. It explains those five ways that people can do that, but also explains why those five ways are so important. it’s it’s it’s a it’s a real guide. It’s not just like a two page infographic. So again, that’s shield your body calm slash tll. And you can also learn more about my products and get a coupon for your first purchase if you’re interested.
Dr. Steven Miletto 53:51
Very cool. Very cool. So I’ll remind everybody about that. And in that information appear in my show notes as well. So good stuff. Thanks. All right, I got two last questions that I’d like to ask my guests. And it has nothing to do with our main topic, but it goes like this. So first, the first one are is how do you keep going when so much is going on that you may want to quit?
R Blank 54:13
So yeah, the my my answer to this, I don’t know if it’s if you’re gonna enjoy it or not. But my answer to this is one foot in front of the other. And I’ve had this I you know, I had this. I used to live. I was developing raw, remote raw property. And I you know, I’m not a property developer. I’m not a builder. I’m not a constructor. And it at times was overwhelming. And I mean, it was really at the point I had to build my own water. And I had no experience in this stuff and it was super overwhelming. And I at that point in my life learned one foot in front of the other. Just focus on what’s right in front of you. Get it done, then worry about what’s next and don’t think too far. ahead if it’s all going to be too overwhelming. So that’s, that’s my answer to that one.
Dr. Steven Miletto 55:04
I love that answer. Actually, that’s awesome. That’s because that’s myself, I have figured out that I’ve discovered that when I’m getting like that, I’ve got to sit back and I gotta go. Alright, how can I minimize this down to just something? one little thing at a time? And, and so I really appreciate your your comment about one foot in front, the other love that the is it? Last question? Do you have a teacher in your past you made a difference in your life? If so, who was it? And what would you say if given the chance to say thank you?
R Blank 55:36
So yeah, this is also a tough question for me, because I had so many teachers that made a big difference in my life. Both my parents are teachers. So I think that that kind of instilled a real respect for, for what teachers do. But if I had to pick one, right, just right now off the top of my head, I would say Mrs. Steinfeld from fifth grade, who is who is unfortunately no longer with us. And I’ll tell you, I don’t talk about this much. But early in my academic career, I was I was not a very good student. I like I remember, I used to tell people, I, I flunked. I skipped kindergarten, and I skipped junior year, but I flunked out a fourth grade. That’s kind of a crazy academic background when I was growing up, but yeah, no, I really did flunk out of fourth grade. And my parents switched me to a new school. And my teacher in fifth grade, the first year at that new school was Mr. Steinfeld. And I don’t actually, I mean, this is a long time ago for me now, I don’t remember exactly what she did. I remember that she cared, and that she saw potential in Maine. And that, I remember when I did well, and I remember that year for me doing well was was a bee. But I remember when I did well, she was so happy for me. And she just believed in me. And so, I mean, it’s not a complex message, I would just say thank you very much.
Dr. Steven Miletto 57:09
That’s cool. Very cool. appreciate you sharing that. Hey, R thanks so much for talking with me. today. EMF radiation is a scary topic that you’ve done a great job of explaining and making people aware. You’ve also taken time to create resources that can help us all become more knowledgeable of potential dangers as well as protect us. So wishing you the best and all you do.
R Blank 57:28
Thank you so much, Dr. Seaver. This was really enjoyable interview. By the way, I know all your listeners already know this. But you just have the fantastic voice for radio and it was a real pleasure listening to it for an hour. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Take care of though. YouTube.
Dr. Steven Miletto 57:46
teaching learning leading k 12 is excited to be a member of voice said radio. Voice Ed radio. Your voice is right here. teaching learning leading k 12 is a proud member of the education Podcast Network podcast for educators podcast by educators. opinions expressed on teaching learning leading k 12 are those are the guests and host of teaching learning leading k 12 is intended to share ideas, advice and suggestions for classroom teachers and school administrators. teaching learning leading k 12 is produced for educational purposes. Thanks for listening, and I hope you’ll share it with your friends.
