WATCH: Debate raging on link between 5G technology, coronavirus pandemic

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Cape Town – Claims that 5G technology played a role in spreading the coronavirus worldwide would have further alarmed residents concerned about the impact of its roll-out in Cape Town. China was reportedly the first country to have more than 100 000 5G towers, with Wuhan being the first to contract the new coronavirus. It has been claimed that Wuhan was the first city to introduce blanketed 5G, with Iran, cruise ships and Italy being among other places where 5G was introduced. In a video recorded at the Health And Human Rights Summit in Tucson, Arizona, on March 12, doctor and anthroposophist Thomas Cowan says every time a fundamentally new electrical technology is introduced, we see a pandemic. "A biological shock wave occurs, because our organism does not know what to do with the stressful new situation. Many people die and the rest survive, but with an excited biology," Cowan said.

This happened in 1918 with the Spanish flu, which occurred with the worldwide introduction of radio traffic.

Cowan says when they asked renowned anthrophosist Rudolf Steiner about the millions of victims of the Spanish flu in 1918, he replied: "Viruses have nothing to do with it. Viruses are reactions of the poisoned cell that, in defence against the poison itself, secretes the viruses to allow the cell to survive.

"Viruses are therefore waste products of the human cells and therefore do nothing themselves.”

Considering the numerous ways in which people are poisoned by antibiotics, radiation, insecticides, radioactivity, medicines, junk food, polluted water and air, and other harmful substances, Cohen says their resistance and their cells are destroyed. The cells themselves secrete the viruses as a defence response.

One version of 5G, called millimeter wave, runs on very high-frequency radio waves. Those signals can't travel long distances, which requires towers to be placed close together and installed in more locations.

That has reignited worries that the 5G radio waves – emanating from land and in space – could produce harmful radiation, causing brain cancer, reduced fertility, headaches and other illnesses.

5G will supposedly be 600 times faster than the current speed of 4G mobile networks, and 10 times faster than the fastest fibre-optic connection in South Africa.

More than 4 000 people have signed a petition on www.change.org to "Stop 5G rollout in Cape Town, South Africa... and while we're at it, the world".

The petition motivation says: "Our health may be under threat on many levels (depending on proximity). Wireless technologies (microwaves) have been shown in countless peer reviewed studies (links below) to have negative effects on cell health, be they minor and debilitating, or severe.

"5G now poses an even more poorly controlled potential threat with extremely high frequency, short range antennas almost everywhere.

"The roll-out has started around the globe with a suspicious urgency on the part of the corporations responsible. To the point of legal immunity from appeals from concerned communities. However, some have succeeded in the USA and hopefully will have an easier time elsewhere…

"It is not enough for local authorities to say that they follow the guidelines for safety, as new standards are desperately needed, tested on actual living cells, drawing from all the research done over the past 20 years.

"It has been shown many times over now, that not only ionizing radiation/heating has a noteworthy effect on cells and that non-ionizing radiation has plenty of effects."

Hout Bay local Angie Curtis has also organised a Facebook group opposed to 5G technology.

“If we allow the 5G Trojan Horse to enter our cities, we will be condemning ourselves to a future of ever-escalating exposure to harmful wireless radiation that will accompany 5G and beyond,” Curtis says.

However, Professor Antoine Bagula, head of the Department of Computer Science at the University of the Western Cape, told the Weekend Argus in November last year: “What is different with 5G compared to other technology is that it’s using high frequencies. It will be much more powerful radiation.

"But the good news is that when you look at the electromagnetic spectrum, there is ionising and non-ionising radiation.

“The ionising is like X-rays and gamma rays – these are the ones which are dangerous to health, which can produce cancer. But 5G is deployed in non-ionising frequencies.”

The 5G claims were also debunked by FullFact, a UK fact checker.

"As we’ve written about before, there is no evidence that 5G is harmful to humans. 5G is the next generation of wireless network technology, following on from 4G.

"Like 4G, 3G and 2G before it, 5G mobile data is transmitted over radio waves – a small part of the whole electromagnetic spectrum (which includes microwaves, visible light and X-rays).

"These radio waves are non-ionising, meaning they don’t damage the DNA inside cells.

"Public Health England has said that there’s no 'convincing evidence' that exposure below the International Commission on Non-Ionising Radiation guidelines can cause adverse health effects.

"These guidelines go up to 300GHz, whereas the maximum for 5G will probably only be in the tens of GHz.

"And regardless, the claimed symptoms of 5G exposure shown don’t match the symptoms of the new coronavirus.

"The post claims that symptoms of 5G exposure include nausea, hair loss and bone marrow damage but the symptoms of Covid-19 include fever and coughing.

"Other symptoms include shortness of breath, aches and pains, nasal congestion, runny nose, sore throat or diarrhoea."

Keri Hilson, an American singer with 4.2 million followers on Twitter, on Sunday sent several tweets that attempted to link the coronavirus to 5G.

"People have been trying to warn us about 5G for YEARS. Petitions, organizations, studies... what we're going thru is the affects (sic) of radiation. 5G launched in CHINA. Nov 1, 2019. People dropped dead."

The Food and Drug Administration and Federal Communication Commission in the US insist there is nothing to be worried about. Most studies haven't found a link between radio frequency signals from cellphones or cell towers and disease, the agencies say.

But because 5G is so new, there's no definitive way to know if it will cause long-term health problems.

Cape Times