WASHINGTON-Baltimore lawyer Peter Angelos and attorneys in Atlanta were expected to file another lawsuit against the wireless industry either Friday or today in Georgia, demanding that mobile-phone carriers supply subscribers with headsets to minimize any potential health risk from radiation.
The action, which also seeks damages against cellular firms for failing to alert consumers about the possibility of radiation injury from phones, is modeled after class-action suits filed by Angelos and others against industry in Louisiana, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York.
Other lawsuits and workers’ compensation claims that allege cell phones caused brain cancer have been filed in Maryland, Georgia, Nevada and California.
The latest lawsuit comes as Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) review findings in a new General Accounting Office report on mobile-phone health concerns. Lieberman and Markey requested the GAO probe last year in response to public concern about conflicting scientific data on mobile phones.
Aides to the two lawmakers said they received the GAO report last Monday but have not yet released it nor decided what, if any, further steps they will take. GAO will release the report to the public in the next 30 days.
Last month, RCR Wireless News reported that GAO was expected to recommend that the Federal Communications Commission and the Food and Drug Administration provide the public with more information on phone radiation and wireless health issues in general.
In addition, RCR reported GAO likely would play down several recent epidemiology studies that major media outlets and the wireless industry interpreted as proof that phones are safe. The studies have been criticized by some as being deficient in part because they failed to take account of heavy and long-term cell-phone use.
The GAO report is believed not to include any recommendation for federal funding of additional research as Markey and other lawmakers have advocated. GAO investigators are expected to have characterized highly touted research jointly undertaken by the FDA and the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association as being limited in scope.
