Lost? You could bee. Photograph: Newcastle University/PA
In the past we've discussed claims of electromagnetic sensitivity - particularly these claims about Wi-Fi sensitivity, and in "Electrosmog in the clear with scientists" by science correspondent James Randerson.
Over in the Independent, there's a different take on the subject: it's not Wi-Fi causing the problems, but mobile phones - and it's not humans who are affected, but bees.
But some scientists suggest that our love of the mobile phone could cause massive food shortages, as the world's harvests fail.
They are putting forward the theory that radiation given off by mobile phones and other hi-tech gadgets is a possible answer to one of the more bizarre mysteries ever to happen in the natural world - the abrupt disappearance of the bees that pollinate crops. Late last week, some bee-keepers claimed that the phenomenon - which started in the US, then spread to continental Europe - was beginning to hit Britain as well.
The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees' navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up.
There is plenty of evidence to suggest that animals use electromagnetic fields for navigation purposes - pigeons, for example, get very confused in areas with strange electromagnetic properties. But already fora such as ElectroSensivity UK are jumping on the reports as heralding the truth about ES.
Does this repudiate vindicate those who believe they are susceptible to Wi-Fi signals (or mobile phone signals or others)? I'm far from convinced.
After all, bees and other animals are not made unwell by changing fields, they simply have their navigational abilities thrown out of line. That, in turn, can lead to death because they are insects.
While the implications are serious - even if caricatured by the doomsday scenarios put forward by the media - it doesn't seem in any way to make the case for illness caused by Wi-Fi sensitivity or any of the other claims. That is an argument between the telecommunications industry and those who believe it is dangerous, not between experts; the scientific case for ES is almost non-existent.
Charles Arthur adds: if you'd like to read about how bees do seem to navigate, read Honey bees navigate according to a map-like spatial memory from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which is peer-reviewed, unlike our own dear newspapers. Bees seem to use visual cues, and other searches turn up the fact that they can detect the polarisation of light, which would also be useful for navigation (which is why you never see bees wearing Polaroid sunglasses, I guess). No mechanism, nor indeed publication, has been put forward that I can find for bees being affected by EMF.
I may have found an earlier study by these authors, which seems to suggest using bees as a model for humans to test whether mobile phones affect learning (Google translated page; here's the original.) No date, though, from these folk at the mathematics institute. They seem to have done a few studies on bees and EMF. But we're really not getting anything that looks like proof of mobile-avoidance among bees.
