Functional Safety Measures and Adverse Health Impacts of Mobile Telephony

Abstract

This paper addresses a gap in safety and electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) regulations and standards, in the commercial, industrial, transportation, healthcare and many other industries (including security and military).The gap exists because existing safety and EMC regulations and standards do not correctly address the issue of electromagnetic interference (EMI) from the viewpoint of lifecycle safety („EMC for Functional Safety‟).Where errors or malfunctions in electronics could possibly have safety implications the resulting safety risks can fall right through these gaps, leaving users at risk from unsafe products or systems and manufacturers at financial risk from liability lawsuits, product recalls, and loss of customer confidence. This is an increasing problem because of the huge increase in the use of electronics (especially computer-based technology) in safety-related applications, and because the developments in electronics that make them more cost-effective also make them more likely to suffer EMI.This paper briefly describes the problem, and then introduces an engineering method that deals with EMI correctly to help reduce functional safety risks in a cost-effective manner – over the lifecycle of a product, equipment, system or installation (abbreviated to „equipment‟ in the rest of this paper).Similar „gaps‟ appear in regulations and standards for legal metrology, security, military and other areas where high reliability is required in situations where there are no direct safety implications. Only a little adjustment would be required to apply the engineering method introduced here to these areas