“The annoyance of sight and the heard pulsating wind turbulence creates indirect adverse health effects. This combined with the direct effects of sleep disturbance may activate the body’s autonomic nervous system to increase sympathetic-mediated responses with endocrinological consequences.”
“Increasingly activated, risk factors that promote adverse cardiovascular consequences may then promote/facilitate/enhance cardiovascular disease – most easily named as hypertension, arteriosclerosis, ischemic heart disease and stroke.”
– Ben Johnson, Testimony before the Madison County Board of Health, Madison Country, Iowa.
Individuals and communities are collectively reporting the same NOCEBO effects, heart palpitations, ringing in the ears, dizziness, nausea, disorientation, sleep disorders, and other disorders from nearby industrial wind. There is no global conspiracy, there is only a mountain of data (data is when you have enough anecdotes) contradicting the narrative that such wind power is clean, safe and free.
Pro-developer witnesses lined up recently at the Iowa Madison County Board of Health’s hearing into wind turbines and health, led by the Iowa Policy Project and the Iowa Environmental Council. Their nine-page, “Wind Turbines and Health” referenced Fiona Crighton (nocebo effect), and Dr. Robert J. McCunney (known for his voluminous rapid-fire testimonies on behalf of wind companies). Their thesis: if you are being reimbursed by the wind turbine company, or hosting, you are much less likely to experience health impacts.
McCunney’s critical review of 2014, states that he received funding from the Canadian Wind Energy Association but that it was all nicely arm’s length and editorially free of any conflict-of-interest. Other dubious references inside the Iowa Policy Project-sponsored report attempt to validate findings by the Canadian Council of Academies, the book end review of wind turbine impacts to the Health Canada bogus study. Some have called these reference materials, studies, reviews, disingenuous, even fraudulent.
These “findings” by conflicted persons, reporting for government agencies and directly for developers and CanWEA or AWEA, find their way through the cooperating, often unknowing persons, in policy and permitting systems: in this instance, the Madison County Board of Health hearings.
Dr. Ben Johnson, Cardiologist, IOWA
Enter Iowa Cardiologist Dr. Ben Johnson, testifying pro bono on the meticulous research behind the “guidelines” recently provided by the World Health Organization (WHO).
WHO advocates a political and moral standard that encourages the burden of proof to fall upon those advocating for a possible challenge to impacts to health. The burden of proof has never rested with the industry: it has fallen on the victims of wind, and their advocates, to prove and test on their own homes, document health impacts for themselves, livestock, pets, and wildlife. Despite the magnitude of the complaints, the similarity, and the universal nature of the harm, the industry continues to provide “experts,” paid consultants whose shabby appearance of scientific endeavor continue to insult not only victims, but also the real science, and true advocates who provide clarity and conscience.
The Board of Health of Madison County, Iowa passed a resolution last week recommending a 1.5-mile setback to protect residences from wind turbine nuisances and harms.
The following excerpts from Dr. Johnson’s testimonies (three) relied on his expertise and study of Adverse Health Effects (AHE) based on his specialty, Cardiology. His CV is about electrophysiology – pacing and defibrillator technology, clinical trials, failed implantable lead technology and developing (with industry) new technologies- -particularly optimizing implantable devices to improve heart performance.)
Dr. Johnson provides the following conclusions to MasterResource.
Industrial Wind Turbines and Adverse Health Effects:
High Level Summary of the Issues:
1) Health – defined (WHO – 2001)
Health should be regarded as a “state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” Note that this would include not only serious health disease — cardiovascular disease, hypertension, insulin-resistance — but also most of the described consequences of wind-turbine annoyance that affect mental and social well-being and contribute to physical debilities.
2) Annoyance: By itself, is considered as having adverse health effects
Noise is the principle impactor, but visually mediated and psychological adverse reactions are frequent causing health impacts to people living in the vicinity of wind turbines.
Cognitive effects are also associated with noise exposure. These include reading, concentration, memory and attention issues. Chronic noise exposure impairs cognitive function (reading comprehension and long-term memory) and a dose-response relationship between the two is supported by both laboratory and field studies. Over 20 studies have reported that noise adversely effects children’s academic performance.
3) Concept of Noise and Sleep Disturbance
Noise pollution in our towns and cities in increasing. More than a nuisance, excessive noise is a health risk. As stated in the WHO 2018 guidelines, “noise is unpleasant and effects the quality of life.” It disturbs and interferes with activities of the individual, including concentration, communication, relaxation and sleep.
Besides the psycho-social effects of community noise, there is concern about the impact of noise on public health, particularly regarding cardiovascular outcomes. The auditory system is continuously analyzing acoustic information, which is filtered and interpreted by different cortical and sub-cortical brain structures.
Arousal of the autonomic nervous system and the endocrine system is associated with repeated temporal changes in biological responses. In the long run, chronic noise stress may affect the homeostasis of the organism due to dysregulation, incomplete adaptation and/or the physiological costs of the adaptation. Noise is considered a nonspecific stressor that may cause adverse health effects in the long run. Such noise may be associated with disordered sleep.
Serious scientific studies of human sleep only began about 50 years ago. According to the restorative theory of sleep, body tissues heal and regenerate during non-REM sleep — particularly stages 3 and 4 associated with predominately slow-wave activity. Brain tissue “heals” during REM sleep and memories of the prior day’s events becomes more “permanent”. Interruption of the mostly ordered transitioning between/to deeper stage sleep by noise can occur with awakenings (>15 secs – associated with subsequent recollection) or with arousals (<15 seconds that may be repetitive and not acknowledged by affected sleeper).
Such recurrent sleep disruptions lead to non-restorative sleep with subsequent activation of the autonomic nervous system. More-heightened sympathetic activation triggers multiple downstream physiologic consequences — hypertension, insulin resistance and complex atherosclerotic vascular disease which may promote plaque build-up and increase potential consequences of fatal and non-fatal heart attacks, angina, stroke and heart arrhythmias.
Indeed, there has been a surge in the incidence of atrial fibrillation (AF) — a fast, chaotic atrial arrhythmia. AF is very frequently associated with obstructive sleep apnea which triggers sleep arousals (among a myriad of other consequences) that lead to non-restorative sleep. Untreated patients with sleep apnea commonly have hypertension, various degrees of insulin resistance and a higher incidence of vascular disease. It is truly remarkable how patients may deny any “trouble sleeping” but suffer from severe sleep apnea that may be amenable to treatment. Treatment in an affected population leads both to less AF and is associated with a decrease the prevalence of associated cardiovascular disease.
Sleep disturbance is reported for those who report hearing wind turbine sound. IMPORTANTLY, there are other disease states where disrupted sleep is triggered by non-awakening “arousals” (e.g. due to apneic/brief hypoxic events associated with obstructive sleep apnea). Similarly, there are recent pilot studies and now ongoing research measuring the observed physiologic changes of accurately reconstructed sound emissions (frequency and loudness) produced during formal sleep studies. The pilot studies suggest that the unique properties of wind noise do adversely affect some aspects of normal sleep architecture. (Our emphasis)
4) Infrasound and Low Frequency Noise (ILFN)
It has been established for nearly 35 years, that industrial turbines emit infrasound (<20 Hz) and low-frequency noise (<160 Hz). Analyzed frequency and sound pressure characteristics of industrial wind turbines emission has shown the emitted sound content (noise) to have these frequencies.
Wind turbine noise is complex, highly variable and has unique characteristics. The amount and type of sound emitted by a wind farm at a given time and in a given location is influenced by many variables including topography, temperature , wind speed, turbine design, the extent to which they are maintained, the number of turbines and their mode of operation.
It has also been established via multiple means of evaluation that the brain can “sense” infrasound as a tonal frequency transitions to a perceptible vibratory quality as the sound frequency lessens. Generally 35-40 dB are described as being needed to “sense/hear” those low frequency noises. Interestingly, ILFN “loudness” may be greater indoors than outdoors at the same location and can cause a building to vibrate resulting in resonance.
A significant proportion of the sound emitted by wind turbines is in the lower frequency range, i.e., below 20 Hz. Humans are more sensitive to low frequency noise, and it can therefore cause greater annoyance than higher frequency sound. The dB(A) weighting (filtering) system is not designed to measure these lower frequency sounds and is not an appropriate way of measuring it. The best way to assess ILFN is to through “raw” unweighted measurements which are not averaged across time and then subjected to detailed “narrow-band” analysis.
5) Evolving Quantification of Societal Impact of Noise Emission
With the published October, 2018 WHO statement, DALYs (Disability-Adjusted Life-Years — which is the sum of years of life lost due to ill-health, disability or early death) have been calculated. One DALY is equivalent to one year of health life lost.
Given measured sound exposures and their exposures to inhabitants in European Union cities, the WHO estimates that 1-1.6 million health life years are lost from traffic noise. Sleep disturbance and annoyance related to traffic noise comprise the main burden (903,000 DALYs for sleep disturbance; 654,000 DALYs for annoyance; 61,000 for ischemic heart disease and 45,000 for cognitive impairment). Clear sleep disturbance is the largest mechanism of harm due to environmental noise.
Rural Iowa does not have significant “background traffic, aviation or train sound emissions,” but could have significant ongoing turbine sound emissions which (although not quantified yet) could, being another environmental noise, reach the impacts like those DALY consequences noted above.
Relatively fewer people are exposed to industrial-size wind turbines, but those individuals would still be experiencing sound emissions with potentially adverse health effects. Unfortunately, the consequences would be greater for the more vulnerable parts of society — the young and elderly.
6) Why don’t we know for sure regarding the health impacts?
Wind Energy has never proven that exposure to industrial wind turbines is safe.
The 2018 WHO statement, for the first time, listed industrial wind turbines as a source of environmental noise and carefully weighed the available data. There were no studies at the time of statement publication to assess the incidence of ischemic heart disease, nor hypertension among other endpoints…. the studies simply had not been done with those studies being quite complex to perform. Indeed, in section 3.4 of the 2018 WHO statement, evidence quality was specifically written as “no studies were available” acknowledging that there was no available data (yet) to confirm an association of sound to adverse cardiovascular outcomes.
The WHO’s turbine noise “conditional” rating of “strength of recommendation” for implementing guidelines reflects a policy-making process with substantial debate and involvement of various stakeholders. Recommendations are rated as either strong or conditional.
In accordance with the prioritization process, the GDG (Guidelines Development Group), set a guideline exposure level of 45 dB L(day-evening-night) average reflective of analysis of an exposure-response curve of four available studies from “highly annoyed populations” showing significant higher adverse health risks above 45 dB.
They felt unable to specify a lower night sound emissions level (during sleep — where sleep disruption is more critical). This omission has been widely criticized by anti-wind factions. Indoor/open-window nighttime sleeping sound levels are best at <33 dB) (Our emphasis)
Another health concern from turbines is the potential harm from radio/electromagnetic exposure emitted by the turbines. This is debated globally. Authors who have voiced their concern of health safety over this have recommended that governmental regulators advise the public of potential risks of exposure and establish limits that incorporate all sources of radio/electromagnetic energy, including wind turbines. They further state: “Until these limits are established, governments should take precautionary and proactive measure to protect public health…”
Similarly, the public and landowners placed at direct and immediate risk of catastrophic turbine failure, have not been provided with recommended radius safety-zone dimensions specific to the Vestas, Model 1100 — which is the turbine model proposed for Madison County.
Despite repeated requests, this critical safety information remains unknown, even in public hearings when MAE (MidAmerican Energy) and Madison County officials who are responsible for public safety are directly questioned. This is relevant in that the last (smaller) model of IWTs (Industrial Wind Turbines) did have guidelines published.
Concerningly, there may be future replacement of existing MAE turbines with larger, more powerful models (on the fixed, existing pedestals). Reportedly, that possibility of up-sizing turbine capacity is reflected in recent Adair County planning minutes for the turbines placed there. Such larger turbines would likely increase the strength of the emissions and, with that, increase the endpoints of incidence and prevalence of turbine-related adverse health effects.
7) At the second of three Madison County public hearing on the variance request by MAE, comments made by the MAE engineers/representatives included that :
1) they “never” assess sound by means other than A-weighting analysis. Because humans cannot hear sounds <20 Hz.
2) they “never” measure any sounds from within the house – “only to the front door”
3) Sound intensities (pressures) from the proposed turbine sites are “calculated.” Only upon recurrent resident requests, will they come to acquire actual sound measurements.
4) They commented that the WHO publications on environmental noise were “getting crazy”
Their industry-paid consultant neurologist/sleep specialist from Boston also spoke at a BOA (Board of Adjustment) meeting, noting:
1) symptoms of annoyance (depression, hopelessness, nausea, vertigo, etc.) could not be associated with the presence of the turbines alone but likely reflect a non-associated separate medical problem
2) he felt it was impossible that ILFN would travel that far from the turbine to actually cause sleep disruption.
All those points are rejected in the most current medical literature. And these points have been included/itemized in successful legal judgements against Wind Energy defendants when reviewing adverse health effects to affected residents.
8) Indeed, data is accumulating about the pivotal but insidious connection of environmental noise causing sleep disturbance and cardiovascular disease.
(These studies are included on page #4 of summarizing information I provided to The Madison County Board of Health). In a more detailed description of the impact of environmental sound, Dr. Dominguez noted a “graded response” of objectively measure vascular disease and quantity and quality of sleep. Extensive multivariate analysis was performed to adjust for a wide range of confounding variables. The presenter noted that the more average times an individual awoke per night, the greater number of vascular plaques were documented. Dr. Fountas did a meta-analysis review of 11 prospective studies correlating self-reported daily sleep duration and cardiovascular morbidity and mortality of over one-million patients without clinical baseline cardiovascular disease that were followed an average of 9.3 years. Those sleeping <6 hrs or >8 hrs had a higher risk of fatal or non-fatal cardiovascular disease compared to those sleeping 6-8 hours which is considered a normal amount to achieve restorative sleep. Longer sleep duration was felt by the authors to possibly reflect morning exhaustion prompting additional sleep hours to “catch-up”.
With that idea of “sleep catch-up,” notable is a Journal of the American Medical Association article published about a month ago that suggested that those who attempted “sleep catch-up” on the weekend actually may have even worse outcomes than those who just resume a “normal” sleep pattern. This was measured by tests of insulin resistance that most directly varies with adrenalin responses to stress. (That article was given to the Madison County Board of Health at their most recent every two-month meeting). Elevated serum insulin levels due to adrenergically-driven insulin resistance is felt to be one of the consequences of sleep disturbance.
9) Recognizing that complete data is lacking to definitely link industrial wind turbines with adverse health, I cite Wind Energy’s apparently sponsored University of Iowa expert panel of the scientific evidence regarding various complaints (which) led to several conclusions (Wind Turbines and Health, Thorne, Osterberg, Johannsen):
1) The current evidence is sufficient to establish a causal relationship between a person’s exposure to wind turbine noise and feelings of annoyance.
2) The current evidence is limited for a causal relationship between exposure to wind turbine noise and sleep disturbance. The panel defined “limited” of a causal relationship as plausible, but that chance, bias and confounding factors could not be ruled out with reasonable confidence. This is in keeping with the WHO stance noted above.
I would ask you, why would you erect a very expensive, contentious (highly to some), greater than 500 foot high tower– with large moving blades without a stated safety radius by the manufacturer, that reportedly will operate for nearly 40 years (Editor’s Note: turbines rarely survive the stated working life of 20 years, and begin to degrade and require repairs and experience serious lost performance between twelve years and fifteen years) and that has never been proven to safe nor free of adverse health effects, that possibly (it is plausible) will cause sleep disturbance and that will likely contribute to some degree of future cardiovascular disease in the nearby affected citizens who had very little to say about it? This when other technologies are available with essentially no health risk (photovoltaic)?
Finally, recognizing someone who has spent his entire professional career reviewing evidence that Wind Turbines Pose Risks, Jerry Punch, Professor emeritus from Michigan State University who recently wrote a peer-reviewed 72-page article that addressed each of two wind energy claims and positions stated the following:
the available literature, which includes research reported by scientists and other reputable professionals in peer-reviewed journals, government documents, print and web-based media and in scientific and professional papers presented at society meetings, is sufficient to establish a general causal link between a variety of commonly observed adverse health effects and noise emitted by industrial wind turbines.
Returning to the 2001 WHO statement in the first paragraph above defining health, “health” is viewed as beyond an absence of acquired physical disease, it also includes mental and social wellness. The mere presence of these huge turbines placed, as proposed, in close proximity to our county residence creates lasting annoyance in at least 20% of those exposed at the proposed siting distances.
Hopefully you are aware of the social outcry of your county against the intrusion of these unwanted disturbances. The annoyance of sight and the heard pulsating wind turbulence creates indirect adverse health effects. This combined with the direct effects of sleep disturbance may activate the body’s autonomic nervous system to increase sympathetic-mediated responses with endocrinological consequences.
Increasingly activated, risk factors that promote adverse cardiovascular consequences may then promote/facilitate/enhance cardiovascular disease – most easily named as hypertension, arteriosclerosis, ischemic heart disease and stroke.
Importantly:
1) Does this prove that “wind turbines” cause disease? — NO
2) Has Wind Energy ever shown that wind turbines are safe and free of adverse health effects? Absolutely Not
3) There is an enormous amount of scientific data to suggest that wind turbines may possibly cause adverse health effects. As noted above, the U of I paper likely paid for by the Wind Energy faction AGREES that there is a plausible causal relationship between exposure to wind turbine noise and sleep disturbance.
The scientific data is rapidly accumulating and getting us closer to absolute confidence that wind turbines “cause disease.” It will be an association, like all disease prevalence, that is statistical… the large numbers needed to prove a correlation that are adjusted for confounding variables in exposed populations with highly predictive statistical significance, are hard to obtain…. but the data is coming.
Wind Energy could do the research needed by exposing monitored residence living various distances from the wind turbines in large enough numbers to meet anticipated statistical significance. All disease-markers/endpoints variables would be catalogued and measured consistently over at least 20 years. All these “test (treated) groups” would be compared with matched control groups without wind turbine exposure and monitored for the same disease process in the same method as the actively “treated” groups. This study would require a supervising Investigative Review Board to protect the test subjects. It would require informed consent from the study participants. Having been a Chairman for the Des Moines Area Investigative Review Board where conducted human research proposals are reviewed, approved and monitored, I seriously doubt that such a study could be done. This is because the health consequences are not completely known, but what is known is adverse in nature (thus making informed consent not possible) and the participants may not derive potential benefit from the study (the EXACT situation for the Madison County residents who would be forced to live with turbine presence) among many other considerations.
Such a pattern of increasing possibility/likelihood and linked causality in our scientific, world-wide evaluations of potential adverse health effects from wind turbine noise and annoyance is impressive. The Oct 2018 WHO report reflects that opening of scientific understanding and the evolving clarification of that risks. The lack of respect for this data by Wind Energy is equally impressive.
I ask you to speak for your neighbors, your family, your community, and for the impacts of Wind Energy will have in future generations, and to those who look to you in your elected position of leadership. Protect the citizens of Madison County against the possibly harmful effects of Wind Energy development as currently proposed by Mid-American Energy. (Bold is the author’s emphasis)
Respectfully, W. Ben Johnson, M.D. Cardiologist/Electrophysiologist, Des Moines, Iowa
Update: WINTERSET, Iowa —The Madison County Board of Health says there is the potential that wind turbines could be bad for your health. The board passed a resolution recommending that any future turbines be built at least a mile and a half from non-participating homes.
The dedication of the good Doctors on the right side of history in the fight to preserve the health and safety of rural residents afflicted by wind industry torture restores faith in humanity. Their courage is also admirable.
Examination of the Crichton material will find that the test signal was NOT the infrasound signal that is commonly attributed to wind trubines. The signal was not one of pulsations and was a single tone (5 Hz in one experiment and 9 Hz in another).
Hence the title of the paper is incorrect as the testing was not of wind turbine infrasound.
Hence the concept of Nocebo as presented by Crichton becomes questionable.
I have spent years investigating the actual acoustic signature of wind turbines and as a memeber of the Acoustical Society of America’s Wind Turbine Working Group have presented multiple papers as to the techical aspects of the acoustic signature.
Because of the short time span of the puslations it is questionable if there is actually infrasound in the sense of a tone.
Pulsations that occur at rate less than 10Hz were defined by Zwicker and Fastl as “fluctuations”. Fluctuations are sensed by the body – not heard.
Persons sensitised to wind turbine noise can identify in the laboratory the prescence of the test signal even when they cannot hear it (see paper to ASA in New Orleans in Dec 2017).
New material in relation to the Crichton “Nocebo” is to be presented in two weeks at the 2019 Internaltional Congress on Acoustics in Germany.
Thank you, Segue. This meaningful comment reminds me of the other doctors, medical personnel, researchers, of the mindset to tell the truth, and explore wind lies as well. Some are listed in the WHO letter to the (World Health Organization), and the list of Quebec physicians, writing for a moratorium, and also the French Academy of Medicine, similarly declaring wind turbines a “nuisance,” asking for a full stop.
https://www.windturbinesyndrome.com/2011/40-doctors-sign-wind-turbine-syndrome-petition-quebec/
Add Dr Ben Johnson, who took likely hundreds of hours to research and present not once, but three times, to his local Board of Health, Madison County.
A substantial list of deniers, mercifully now discredited, can be found on the Waubra Website, 2014. More can be added, certainly. But the accruing numbers of physicians, experts, now in the hundreds and multiples of hundreds, show us that right will stand up to might.
Dr Hallstein, of Falmouth, MASS, is quoted by Waubra:
“There is extensive clinical experience and a body of peer reviewed research evidence, which supports clinical concerns about the adverse health consequences of both chronic sleep deprivation, and chronic stress, regardless of the specific cause of that sleep deprivation or stress. 54,55,56,57 Dr William Hallstein, a psychiatrist from Falmouth, USA stated the following in a recent letter to the Falmouth Board of Health 58:
“In the world of medicine illnesses of all varieties are destabilized by fatigue secondary to inadequate sleep. Diabetic blood sugars become labile, cardiac rhythms become irregular, migraines erupt and increase in intensity, tissue healing is retarded, and so forth, across the entire field of physical medicine. Psychiatric problems intensify and people decompensate. Mood disorders become more extreme and psychotic disorders more severe.”
“Those who are young and fit report taking longer to be adversely impacted by exposure to wind turbine noise, unless they have underlying physical and mental health conditions or acknowledged risk factors such as a history of migraines, inner ear pathology or motion sickness, which make them more vulnerable or susceptible.”
Thanks, Steven Cooper. We are all looking forward to receiving news of your upcoming presentations in Germany at the International Congress on Acoustics. I hope you will let us interview you again. Fiona Crichton also is of the fame that: wind turbine “syndrome” is a “communicated disease.” Of course, that theory has gone down now with a solid “THUD” in the world of victims and experts.
Thank you again, very sincerely, for all you do, to expose a more meaningful Language and Understanding of the multi faceted pieces of wind turbine ‘noise.’
Listening to the raw truth from people reporting harm from turbines, that are sited too close to their homes, and watching the deterioration of health has been a devastating experience. These people chose to live in the quiet countryside in ‘deep silence’ in order to optimize their mental and physical health. They chose to be close to nature for their well being. They did not consent to being harmed!
Cardiovascular related episodes, caused by surrounding turbines, when barometric pressure fluctuations and certain wind speeds occur, are downright traumatizing.
Anecdotal reports ought to be more than enough to cause ethical people to demand that these turbines be turned off.
And forced relocation is absolutely unacceptable. Anyone suggesting that people leave their homes is complicit in this crime.
Many medical people have not made the connections between people reporting well known psychological and physical symptoms of harm and the turbines in their communities. Instead these doctors are prescribing drugs to mask the symptoms. These drugs can have serious side effects and lead to iatrogenic disease.
This is a human rights violation and those who are being harmed should not have to endure further harm and stress trying to satisfy legal or scientific requirements to validate their harm. This is also a violation of the Nuremberg Code. Kurt Devlin was right about this!
The harm from LFN and infrasound, according to expert, Dr. Mariana Alves-Pereira, is both cumulative and irreversible. She has publicly declared that knowing what she knows about the harm, she would not live within 20 km from wind turbines!
Only those who have genocidal ideology toward rural residents, who are forced to live with these turbines, would insist on having people who are honestly reporting harm, waste vital time and energy proving it somehow.
Both the legal and scientific process to prove harm is within a ‘rigged box’ designed to delay… delay… delay. These delays have serious consequences.
The liability for those who are responsible for this harm, at a moral level, must be/will be fully realized.
People who acknowledge their birth right to act out of free will and follow their conscience understand this clearly.
True advocates for people being harmed act out of courage and a sense of urgency.
Thank you, Pauli. And thank you for organizing with Professor Mann, the upcoming event at the University of Waterloo with Mariana Alves-Pereira. She is a brilliant communicator. I pray they will receive records and reports from their testing at homes and so on, if that is what they are agreeing to. I am sure Ms Alves-Pereira will respond appropriately and accept the challenge of the acoustic testing demands, which are complex and varied. As noted, this is a professor with vast knowledge of VAD (Vibro Acoustic Disease) and ILFN. Anyone lucky enough to hear of her studies and findings is very fortunate.
More and more, people are finding physicians like Dr. Ben Johnson, who are ringing the bell for honesty, and who are finding the tentative or very concrete relationships between sleep deprivation and chronic or advancing disease. We are very grateful for this kind of pro bono testimony. It is so purely driven, and offered with the intent of helping his IOWA Coalition, and more beyond that.
[…] https://www.masterresource.org/wind-turbine-noise-issues/health-effects-of-wind-turbines-testimony-o… […]
The overwhelming and constantly mounting scientific and medical evidence linking industrial wind turbines to very serious (and sometimes catastrophic) health effects is well sampled in this article by the author, Lange.
Dr. Ben Johnson, a Cardiologist, from Iowa, has given testimony before the Madison County Board of Health, Madison Country, Iowa, in the form of a well-articulated treatise covering the known health dangers. The bravery of a medical specialist like Dr. Johnson, going on record without remuneration to sound the warning and an altruistic cry for protection and justice against the industrial wind turbine catastrophy is the stuff of “David and Goliath” and quite extraordinary. He is one of the well respected, independent and unpaid Cardiac experts that will surely face the wrath of the “Green Brigade” (those who try to bury the health problems caused by industrial wind turbines).
I applaud Dr. Johnson’s initiative and I applaud Master Resource and Sherri Lange for continuing to document the evidence and call the wind lobby’s farcical bluff.
Many thanks, Michael Spencley. Praise is indeed due: important to note that likely every person on the pro side of the project testifying at the Board of Health, was remunerated. Not the witnesses against, nor of course Dr. Johnson.
I am very impressed with the wide scope of reading and study that Dr Johnson did in order to prepare. One needs to zig zag between the last 30 or so years, and then weight the evidence. It is overwhelming now. And the link to cardiac health, or not, is key to our understanding of basic survival and health. Many that we hear of, have family members who have suffered cardiac events since turbines have arrived in their community. Of course it is not all about the heart. It is also every organism and mechanism of health and life.
“The Golden West Wind Energy Center in Calhan, Colorado, which consists of 145 453-foot tall industrial wind turbines, has been fully operational since October 2015. Residents living within the wind farm project’s footprint have reported negative physical and psychological effects from the turbines. Concern has now shifted to the suspected effects the turbines are having on the animals in the area.
According to the September 2015 issue of “The New Falcon Herald,” the effects on humans range from dizziness and nausea to concerns about dirty electricity and the potential for the electromagnetic waves to cause an irregular heartbeat, or atrial fibrillation.
Domestic animals are in grave danger, too, based on worldwide accounts.”
Thank you.
This event has been arranged by Professor Richard Mann at the University of Waterloo.
Speaker: Mariana Alves-Pereira
Title: Infrasound & Low Frequency Noise: Physics, Cells, Health and History
Date: Thursday September 12, 2019
Time: 1 pm
Location: University of Waterloo
Room: DC 1302 (Davis Center)
Speaker Bio:
Mariana Alves-Pereira holds a B.Sc. in Physics (State University of New York at Stony Brook), a M.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering (Drexel University) and a Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences (New University of Lisbon). She joined the multidisciplinary research team investigating the biological response to infrasound and low frequency noise in 1988, and has been the team’s Assistant Coordinator since 1999. Recipient of three scientific awards, and author and co-author of over 50 scientific publications (including peer-reviewed and conference presentations), Dr. Alves-Pereira is currently Associate Professor at Lusófona University teaching Biophysics and Biomaterials in health science programs (nursing and radiology), as well as Physics and Hygiene in workplace safety & health programs. Mariana Alves-Pereira can be readily reached at: m.alvespereira@gmail.com.
Thank you, Pauli Sommer. This is an important event and we hope that participants/attendees will include politicians who have been invited from the Ontario Legislature.
I’m so thankful for the testimony of Dr. Ben Johnson and its publication on this site. As usual the quality of comments here is outstanding. The contributions of Steven Cooper and Mariana Alves-Pereira will be further augmented by their presentations in Germany and Ontario respectively. On that note I wish to share announcement of a Wind Turbine Noise/Public Health Discussion co-sponsored by NYS Senator Robert Ortt and wind opposition group Save Ontario Shores. The event will feature presentations by audiologist Dr. Jerry Punch and acoustician Robert Rand. Additionally, environmental attorney Gary Abraham will speak about the intersection of wind turbine noise concerns and NY State wind turbine permitting policy. Negatively impacted wind turbine neighbors from across NY State will give brief statements of their experiences of adverse health effects. This panel discussion is the first of its kind in NY State. It is scheduled from 4 to 6 pm at Erie Community College North Campus, 6205 Main St., Williamsville, NY , Gleasner Hall Auditorium. Parking and admission are free.
Thank you, Mark. Dr. Mariana Alves-Pereira gave a wonderful, as usual, presentation. This is available for viewing on this link. She urged people who are impacted to leave their homes at least for respite trips, but also to consider long term exposures and how much they could manage it. Dose response seriously important.
Please also send us the link for the presentation in NY organized by Save Ontario Shores?
Talk:
https://uwaterloo.ca/computer-science/events/seminar-infrasound-and-low-frequency-noise-physics-cells
Webcast (“Live Stream”):
https://livestream.com/itmsstudio/events/8781285
[…] Please also note his reference to the newly minted cautions by the Madison County Board of Health. Clearly he has read the work of Dr. Ben Johnson, whose testimony certainly led to the Board’s decision to request larger setbacks. See excerpt below, Dr Johnson quoted on Master Resource. […]
[…] Please also note his reference to the newly minted cautions by the Madison County Board of Health. Clearly he has read the work of Dr. Ben Johnson, whose testimony certainly led to the Board’s decision to request larger setbacks. See excerpt below, Dr Johnson quoted on Master Resource. […]
https://www.kcci.com/article/madison-county-to-decide-on-wind-turbine-setbacks/29204876#
WINTERSET, Iowa —
Madison County Supervisors on Tuesday approved a second reading of a proposal to enforce wind turbine setbacks on solar energy projects.
The proposal will get at third and final reading in two weeks.
September 24, 2019
[…] given the general pushback in North America by communities, public health agencies such as Madison IOWA, declaring that wind turbines can cause harm, and arguing for larger setbacks. With Facebook and […]
The Madison County Board of Health says there is the potential that wind turbines could be bad for your health. The board passed a resolution recommending that any future turbines be built at least a mile and a half from non-participating homes.
There needs to be a moratorium on all wind turbines in the United States.
Restart coal and start approval of Safe Nuclear power plants.
I’m still trying to figure out how wind turbines cause all of these issues, yet the hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of cars that pass along I-80 every year (which I can clearly hear from my current home and could from my childhood home…the sound used to lull me to sleep on hot, humid summer nights with the windows open) are not responsible for this also. We have had the Eisenhower Highway System in place for how many decades now? I know president Trump tried to make these a bogey man by claiming they make a noise that sounds like, “RRRRrrrr RRRrrrrrr.” Having stood directly below one as the blades were whizzing past, I can attest that they made a “WHOOOOfffff WHOOOOffff” sound and nothing more that I could detect. If noise causes all of these issues, we had better stop construction of skyscrapers, because the noise generated from construction can be deafening when you walk directly past a site; and having worked in buildings next to a 35-story building going up, you hear the noise all day long. My ticker is still going strong. We all hear and believe what we want to hear and believe. I, however, speak from my own experience with constant traffic noise from I-80 in Newton from age 4 to day (that totals 51 years of nearly constant traffic noise…it did shut down for a major accident and some snow storms over the years) and from standing directly beneath a spinning turbine. I can only tell you what I know from personal experience…and I take studies and opinions with a shaker of salt these days. By the age of 55, I know to trust my own “lying ears and eyes.”
Industrial wind turbines, first of all, are creatures of special government favor and wound the grid by their dilute, intermittent nature. They are an intrusion on nature from politics.
There is permanent noise and light flicker, and other nuisances are present. The neighboring home owners report a lot of negatives from the enormous structures. That is why a ‘civil war’ is going on at the grassroots from on-the-spot environmentalists.