The use of cell phones for all sorts of different tasks is only growing as they become more advanced. The most common uses these days seem to be more text messaging and browsing the Internet rather than actually placing a call. Now, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) is saying that it might be time to take a second look at the health risks that can come from increased cell phone use.

Specifically, the GAO says that the government should look again at standards for radiation exposure emanating from cell phones. The reason for this reassessment seems to be one less based on a new study showing real danger, as it is simply that U.S. standards have fallen behind those of other countries around the world. The exposure limits that are currently the standard in the United States were set way back in 1996, when cell phones were certainly gaining steam in popularity, but were still way behind the popularity levels that they are currently.

The standards, set by the FCC (News - Alert) back then, may not be up to par when it comes to current research about radio-frequency energy that phones emit and the requirements for the tests may fall short of measuring the maximum exposure in all of the possible usage conditions. A report issued by the GAO on July 24th seems to underline that there are real problems with the standards the government currently recognizes. The testing standards are so far behind the curve that the agency believes exposure could be exceeding the FCC’s limits on a fairly regular basis.

At least some members of Congress seem to understand and agree with the warnings coming from the Accountability Office. “With mobile phones in the pockets and purses of millions of Americans, we need a full understanding of the long-term impact of mobile phone use on the human body,” Representative Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, said recently in a statement.

The FCC recently said that it does indeed plan to evaluate the antiquated standards while industry specialists talk more about the very real dangers that could be presented from overexposure. “The United States is behind on the science,” Devra Lee Davis, founder of the Teton County, Wyoming-based Environmental Health Trust, said in an interview. “There’s been this dogmatic belief that there cannot be an effect.”

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