It can safely be said that we are living at times that are some of the most sanitized and paranoid in the history of humanity. For instance, just look at the way people raise their kids. The kids are taught that everyone they do not know or remember is a molester just waiting to get them. We do this to ourselves as well. We are more scared than ever before and we are all anxious about stuff our parents and especially our grandparents never thought about. We are rendering ourselves helpless without overactive imaginations that create a life-threatening hazard out of a pair of steps and make us see shadows in the dark that are out to get us. However, it is not all bad.

Namely, it is thanks to this elevated sense of paranoia and self-preservation that we have discovered a number of things that might actually be harmful for our health and that are not entirely paranoid when you look at it closer. For instance, just sixty years ago, people were puffing away, not being aware that cigarettes are harmful. We used to insulate our homes with asbestos and so on. These days, pretty much all the studies and trials that go into testing new products has to do with the safety of such products. And yet, there are certain things that you cannot avoid and also those things that are dangers which still have to be conclusively proven. The first thing that comes to mind are cell phones that are pretty much a part of everyone’s life and that can have some quite harmful effects on the human body and safety in general.

First of all, there is the issue of microwave electromagnetic radiation, or what your grandparents call simply radiation. Namely, cell phones generate certain amount of microwave frequency power and this power can be absorbed by the human body. In general, the cell phones are monitored when manufactured so that the radiation emanating from phones cannot affect the genes. However, there are still thermal effects of this type of radiation as well as something called blood-brain leakage. In addition to this, there have been a number of studies that have shown that increased amounts of time spent talking on cell phones can detrimentally affect your health in other ways than this.

You might think that it is therefore a good thing that people are mostly texting these days, especially the younger generations that seem to communicate almost exclusively by texts, even if they are in the same room. However, poking at your phones with your thumb can cause something called RSI, or repetitive stress injury that is sustained as thumbs are not supposed to be used in this repetitive and actually quite strenuous way.  And if you thought that this is where things end, you are very much mistaken. In case you didn’t know, there is also something called call phone elbow that affects certain nerves that get strained too much when holding up a phone.

Of course, we must not fail to mention the safety hazard that cell phones present when they are used while driving. The studies have shown that driving and talking at the same time is the same as driving after a couple of drinks. Texting is even worse and what is absolutely terrifying is the fact that hands free devices do very little to minimize the risks.

It goes without saying that cell phones are not the only gadgets that can pose risk to our health and safety. For instance, it is a well-known fact that using headphones with the volume turned up real high can damage the hearing and substantially so. Big flat TVs can also pose a risk, especially if there is a small child in the house which could be crushed under such a TV. Laptops are also a risk of sorts as it has been deemed that men who use them in their laps are risking their fertility due to heat.

However, in the end, it is important not to become paranoid about it all. It is a smart thing to take at least some care when using certain gadgets (cell phones while driving for instance) and not to turn into a hermit that uses nothing more advanced than a stick and a rock because they read some article where it says that their cell phone is going to fry their brain. The truth is always somewhere in the middle.