EXPO-ENFANTS

Durada

13/11/2019 - 12/03/2023

Coordinador

Mònica Guxens Junyent

Finançadors

Agence Nationale de Securite Sanitaire de l’Alimentation de l’Environnement et du Travail

The overall objective of EXPO-ENFANTS is to characterise the use, sociological determinants and RFEMF exposure from RF-EMF emitting connected devices in children at different ages.

This will be achieved through three specific aims:

1. Collection of information on the use of different communicating and connected devices and technologies, including type of device, uses and position, in prospective cohorts of children/adolescents of different ages (pre-school, school, adolescence) in three countries (France, the Netherlands, Spain);
2. Investigate the sociological determinants of device use in children through media and literature reviews, comparisons of network operator offers, and study the relation between sociological factors and uses by including a sociological questionnaire in the prospective birth and childhood cohorts;
3. Estimate resulting RF-EMF exposure in children (RF power absorbed in different organs, focusing specifically on the brain, genital organs and the whole body) by age, device, type of use/APP, communication technology and sociological factors, as well as accumulated and integrative RF “dose” over time and devices.

As described above, there is currently little information on the uses of communicating and connected devices, APPs and technologies in children at different age groups, and the little that exists refers to uses some years ago, when the offer and uptake —in terms of devices, applications and communication technologies— differed substantially from what it is today and how it is evolving.

A better characterisation of uses in existing established population-based studies will provide important information for society and regulators, allow the evaluation of the level of RF-EMF exposures in young people in different age groups in the next years of the project, overall and by type of device, use and communication technology. This will also provide important information to assess the potential health impact of RF-EMF exposures in young people and improve questionnaires for future epidemiological studies of the possible health effects of RF-EMF in children and adolescents. It will also provide insights on which sociological factors explain the different types of uses and RF-EMF exposure in children and how this can be used to ensure exposure reduction.

An important aspect of EXPO-ENFANTS is that it will build upon the considerable information about devices, uses and exposure assessment models developed in previous projects (CREST, ACCEDERA, MOBIKids and MOBI-EXPO and GERoNiMO) and on well established population based birth and childhood cohorts.

Total Funding

176,748 €