A Report on Non-Ionizing Radiation

No Bids for NTP RF–Animal Studies

June 10, 2004

The U.S. National Toxicology Program (NTP) was ready to spend some $10 million on RF research, but no one wanted it.

In February, the NTP issued a request for proposals to carry out a number of animal studies on the possible cancer risks associated with wireless communications. Not a single lab responded by the April 8 deadline. No other RF studies are underway in the U.S. at this time.

When asked for a comment in mid-June, Dr. Ron Melnick of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) in Research Triangle Park, NC, who is coordinating the NTP RF effort, replied, “We hope to have a solution shortly.”

Most observers had expected the Battelle Pacific Northwest Labs in Richland and the IIT Research Institute (IITRI) in Chicago to bid for this work. Both labs have carried out large-scale EMF–animal studies for the NIEHS and/or the NTP in the past.

NTP,  
FDA,  
IITRI,  
NIEHS,