Integrative Medicine: A Clinician’s Journal (IMCJ): Thank you for talking to me about your presentation at the Environmental Health Symposium. To start, can you tell me a little about your background?
Dr Brown: Sure thing. I graduated from the University of Miami medical school in Florida in 1991 and then went into a diagnostic radiology residency program in Pittsburgh. After residency, I completed a fellowship in musculoskeletal imaging in San Diego. Following training, I practiced first in academic centers including at NYU and at the Cleveland Clinic in Florida, and then in private practice.
I’ve been a radiologist now for about 30 years. During that time, I spent a few years working as a locum tenens physician as well where I traveled and experienced practice in different parts of the country. That was probably the most interesting part of my career. Seeing how different people live in different parts of the country really gave me a sense of how the environment affects people’s health. Different segments of the population living in different areas suffer from different maladies. It was eye-opening.
IMCJ: Have you primarily worked in conventional medicine?
Dr Brown: I’ve always worked in conventional medicine. It wasn’t until I wrote a book that came out I think 3 years ago now, called Toxic Home/Conscious Home, that I veered off into the realm of wellness. I put my name out there to help spread the word that being healthy meant taking proactive steps to be well, to improve your health before you get sick. The premise of my book was to reduce toxins in the home. That was really my initial venture into the alternative realm in traditional medicine.
IMCJ: When you talk about toxins in the home, would you consider EMF to be a toxin?
Dr Brown: Absolutely. I included a whole chapter on EMF, which is interesting because it has now become an issue in my own life; at the time I wrote the chapter, it wasn’t, or at least I didn’t think it was. I originally learned about EMF 8 or 9 years ago. I went to an Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M) conference and attended an all-day seminar on the health effects of EMF. It was there I learned about EMF for the first time. I started my book covering biochemical sources of toxicity in terms of everything we ingest, inhale, or absorb. From there I went into energetic sources of toxicity and included chapters on sound, light, and EMFs. I was trying to get people to understand that even though they couldn’t see these toxins, they were still potentially being hurt by them. These energetic toxins can hurt the immune system and need to be dealt with if you really want to achieve a state of wellness.
IMCJ: And those toxins, do you believe they have an impact on chronic health issues?
Dr Brown: Most definitely. EMF, like many other toxins, causes oxidative stress which brings the damage right down to the cellular level. If the cell is under stress then it doesn’t function properly, and you can extrapolate that to organ systems. Eventually the whole organism can become damaged because the individual cells are stressed.
IMCJ: And is that at a higher level now than what it was 10 years ago or is it consistent?
Dr Brown: Our exposure to EMF keeps increasing. The introduction of human-generated EMF was back in the late 1800s when the telegraph was installed. And actually, people got sick back then too. People who lived near the telegraph lines got sick with a condition they called neurasthenia. When they put up electrical lines around the world, more people got sick because electrical lines also generate EMF. And so now as we’ve increased the use of higher frequencies to generate methods of wireless communication, we have really polluted the environment with frequencies that are affecting our physiology. Each time they open up a new band for communication, it is affecting us in some way.
IMCJ: Do you find that people who have chronic health issues, like type 2 diabetes or hypertension, are impacted more by EMF?
Dr Brown: It’s very hard to isolate the effects of EMF now because we’re swimming in it – it’s everywhere, especially in this country and in Western Europe. But many believe that the increases in hypertension, thyroid disease, obesity, and diabetes are all related to chronic EMF exposure. Because of oxidative stress, mitochondria have become less efficient, which can lead to diabetes and other chronic diseases.
IMCJ: How does EMF relate to COVID-19, which is the focus of your presentation?
Dr Brown: It’s interesting, my talk is on a taboo subject. Most health care professionals are very hesitant to even mention COVID-19 and EMF in a sentence together. Linking the two has become a conspiracy theory. What I’ve done in my talk is to look at the health effects of EMF, in general, and then to consider how we can relate those effects to our COVID-19 response. What does oxidative stress do in terms of our ability to fight off the virus? How is our immune system in general affected by EMF? The innate immune system is affected directly by EMF and also indirectly through EMF’s effect on the thyroid gland. EMF can also cause increased viral mutation through the formation of reactive oxygen species.
This presentation’s going to be one that opens the door to discussion because we need to have this discussion. It’s not really about COVID-19, it’s more about EMF. COVID-19 will eventually go away, but there’ll be something else that comes along. With the health of our population being damaged like this, we’re going to more easily succumb to something, whether it’s COVID-19 or the next thing that comes along.
IMCJ: Do you find that the people who are going to attend EHS would be very interested in your EMF/EMR concept, because for them they get it – they already understand it? Do you find that conventional practitioners get the concept, or do they make that connection?
Dr Brown: No, most don’t. My sister was in an interesting study. A number of years ago, she was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism. Her primary doctor sent her to an endocrinologist who repeated the lab work and said, “Yes, she has hyperthyroidism.” And so he offered her either an ablation with radioactive iodine or surgery. She asked me about her options. It was soon after I had gone to the A4M conference where I had learned about EMF. And I said to her, “I wouldn’t do either. Just wait and see what happens for now.” She had the test repeated 6 months later, but she was still hyperthyroid. And her endocrinologist, again, said to her, “You really need to do something about this.” So she called me distressed and she said, “Well, what do you think I should do?”
And I just thought to ask her, “Where’s your Wi-Fi router? Is it in your bedroom?” And she said, “Yes, it is.” I said, “Why don’t you move it down into the basement and then give yourself a couple of months to let your thyroid gland rest and then repeat the lab work.” So she told her endocrinologist of my idea that the thyroid gland was reacting to the Wi-Fi router. My sister said he was incredulous. I’m sure he must have thought I was a wacko, but he had no choice but to agree to wait on a treatment plan. When my sister went back to have her labs repeated, her thyroid levels had normalized.
And she’s never had hyper- or hypothyroidism again. I never spoke to the endocrinologist, but I’d be surprised if he took the same approach with any of his other patients. Most doctors don’t understand how EMF could possibly cause health effects. But whether or not they know or agree with it, it’s real. Unfortunately, clinicians are not taught about EMF in school. And so, it’s not accepted by them as being valid science.
IMCJ: What do you hope will be the takeaway for people who attend your presentation?
Dr Brown: I want them to understand that EMF is a source of oxidative stress, just like many other toxins, and it should be treated as such. They really should teach their patients to try to limit exposure as much as possible and they should instruct their patients to increase their consumption of antioxidants accordingly. That’s not to say, of course, that this is a recommended method for avoiding COVID-19. That’s a different discussion.
IMCJ: It’s a two-pronged issue. The first is preventing COVID-19 and the second is, if you get it, how do you get through it without significant issues? And does EMF impact both of those or is there more on preventative?
Dr Brown: That’s an interesting question. I do think there are compounding negative health effects from EMF that affect our response to COVID-19. Certainly they both challenge the immune system. Another potential effect is on the formation of blood clots; I can’t prove it, but it would make sense because EMF exposure can cause blood to aggregate in rouleaux formation and rouleaux formation can cause an increased propensity to develop clots. Blood clots are one of the pathologic features of COVID-19 that cause so much morbidity. So if you have a condition that’s increasing your propensity to aggregate blood cells and it makes the incidence of blood clot formation more likely, that’s a significant effect.
The virus attaches to cells that have an ACE2 receptor and there are a lot of organs that have ACE2 receptors, including the heart. EMF can also affect the heart.
IMCJ: As decimating as COVID-19 has been, it has opened up a lot of areas that people are now looking at and determining how we can treat people.
Dr Brown: This is a strange disease that has caused us to re-evaluate. Treating COVID-19 is complex and beyond the scope of my talk. I have looked at the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to further explore the health effects of EMF. Up to this point, there’s been a lot of discussion regarding EMF and whether or not it causes cancer. That seems to be the big question everybody wants to know, ‘Does it cause brain cancer?’ Another focus has been on defining and validating the condition of electro-hypersensitivity. People with this condition develop debilitating symptoms from electromagnetic field exposure. Their lifestyles have to be permanently changed to avoid exposure to EMFs. While they suffer, others unaffected are still questioning whether or not this is a real diagnosis or more of a psychological problem. Although there’s been research into the effects of EMF on the immune system, heart function, and other organ systems, this is an opportunity for us to say, ‘How is EMF affecting our overall health in a practical way? How is EMF affecting our ability to fend off disease?’
IMCJ: Which means that also more practitioners should be interested in the topic.
Dr Brown: Yes, they really should. Physician awareness of EMF is going to happen. I talked with my friend, Magda Havas, on the subject. She is a pioneer in the field of environmental toxins, including EMF, and she said that she’s optimistic. She pointed out several significant changes that we as a society have made to reduce our exposure to environmental contaminants. I thought back to a time that really wasn’t that long ago when people were allowed to smoke cigarettes on planes and restaurants and in all common areas. But slowly and surely those liberties were taken away once we all realized that even people who were exposed passively to smoke were getting sick.
I think the same thing’s going to eventually happen with EMF, but first physicians need to be educated. Eventually, I think there will be designated rooms for cell phone use in airports and restaurants. Ethernet cables and fiberoptic will become the norm at home and in businesses. New safer technology will emerge. I think it is crucial for us to reverse direction and forge a new path. I hope that’s where we’re eventually going to head.
IMCJ: Thank you very much for your time today. Hopefully this will be some great information to generate more interest in EHS.