WASHINGTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–On May 16, Children’s Health Defense (CHD) and 50 other safe tech and health advocacy non-profits filed legal comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in response to the FCC’s request for comment on how to “prevent and eliminate digital discrimination.” The proceeding was required by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (“Infrastructure Act”) and President Biden’s Executive Order 13985. The cosigners include Frank Clegg, former president of Microsoft Canada and founder of Canadians for Safe Technology and Dr. Kent Chamberlin, a commissioner on New Hampshire’s pioneering 5G Commission.

CHD and the other “Advocates for the EMS Disabled” called for acceptance, affirmance and inclusion of the Electromagnetically Sensitive or EMS disabled community, an increasingly large swath of those harmed by wireless technology, including cell towers, smart meters, Wi-Fi and phones. CHD is calling for, as a matter of right, access to wired (fiber-based) broadband to the premises for the EMS disabled.

EMS is a term that has been used since 2002 by the U.S. Access Board, an independent federal agency designed to advise other federal agencies on guidelines for disability accommodation. The Access Board promised an effort to remove barriers-to-access for the EMS disabled. Twenty years later, however, that promise has not been fulfilled.

The CHD legal comments explained that the EMS disabled community experiences a unique form of “digital discrimination.”

“These individuals simply cannot be around RF (wireless) Radiation because it makes them sick,” said CHD president and general counsel Mary Holland. Advocates for the EMS Disabled, support the Commission’s enunciated goals to advance “equity in the provision of and access to digital communication services and products for all people of the United States, without discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, or disability.” They observed, however, that the EMS sensitive and EMS disabled are suffering largely because of the FCC’s own actions, since it is the agency pushing to flood all parts of the country and invade people’s homes with wireless radiation – even if it severely harms millions of Americans.

CHD’s comments were accompanied by a white paper written by Susan Foster and Odette J. Wilkins, “Eliminating Digital Discrimination for the EMS Disabled.” The paper provides suggestions for accommodation, including “wireless free zones” in public places.

Contacts

Rita Shreffler
202-599-1461