Two weeks ago, we published a review of reports – all of them from outside Germany – on the GMA’s recent resolution on the health impacts of wind turbines. It is worth noting that there have been no additional German reports since that publication.
Wind Noise, Health, & Safety
I’ve received a response from the German Medical Association – a group that The Australian claims were moving to ban wind turbines in Germany. As I described, they weren’t, but I thought I’d check.
The judge should request the medical records of complainants from periods both before and after the operation of wind farms, to settle the matter of whether the complaints were sufficiently serious to have been given medical attention, and that they did not have these problems before the wind farm commenced operation.
But many energy and environmental analysts, who see a switch to renewable energy as long overdue, have been dismayed by this hostility to a source of electricity that they see as much more benign in its environmental and health impacts than the coal, nuclear or even gas-fired electricity generation it displaces.
TSP Canada Towers Inc., a manufacturer of wind towers in Thorold, has pleaded guilty and fined $80,000 after a worker was crushed by components being moved along a line two years ago.
Currently, there is no further existing statistically-significant evidence indicating any association between wind turbine noise exposure and tinnitus, hearing loss, vertigo or headache.
Scaremongering about the health effects of wind power is irresponsible. It causes enormous anxiety for some people and it threatens to derail a promising and necessary industry for this country.
Spreading health fears can itself result in harm. A BBC Panorama report on the ‘health dangers of wifi’ warped a collection of already-flawed ‘studies’ to present the theory that WiFi causes health impacts. Subsequent research showed that people ‘primed’ with this documentary perceived a greater severity of symptoms, compared to a control group shown scientific information.
The Evidence on Wind Farms and Human Health information paper was released on Wednesday and is the result of a review of more than 4,000 documents on the connection between wind farms and health.
By now I’m sure you know the score. America’s anti-vaccination movement has steamrolled its way across the country, leaving a trail of sick people in its wake. Measles is back. Whooping cough is back. And it’s all because we spent the last decade watching people like Jenny McCarthy concoct a narrative that vaccines are unsafe. This is a public health crisis that’s simply inexcusable.
