Ask TreeHugger: Can I Stand In Front of the Microwave?
by Helen Suh MacIntosh, Cambridge, MA, USA on 03. 1.07
Question: Is it really dangerous to stand in front of the microwave while it's cooking something?
Response: Microwave ovens cook food using microwave radiation (at a frequency of 2450 mHz), which is also used by mobile phones, TV broadcasting, and radar systems. Microwave radiation differs from radiation produced from the sun or X-rays, in that it is non-ionizing and thus non-cancer causing. Nevertheless, the use of microwave radiation to cook food has raised some concerns about microwave ovens, generally because of possible radiation leaks, nutrient loss, and the possibility of cancer causing food byproducts.
Standing in front of your microwave may increase your exposures to microwave radiation; however, such increases are likely to be low, especially when compared to your exposures to microwave radiation from your cell phone. Exposures to microwave radiation are kept low by the oven design, which makes sure that microwaves stay inside the oven and are only produced when the oven is on and the door is shut. Radiation leaks around and through the glass door are generally below levels recommended by international standards.
In the United States, microwave ovens are regulated by the US Food and Drug Administration, who set safety requirements for new microwave ovens of 1 mW/cm2, measured 5 cm away from the oven surface. [This requirement sets the rate of energy flow per unit energy.] The maximum permissible radiation level is higher for older microwave ovens, with an allowable level of 5 mW/cm2, measured 5 cm away from the oven surface. Both levels are thought to be safe and to pose no risk to your health.
You should be aware, however, that your oven could leak more microwave radiation, if it gets damaged, is dirty, or is improperly operated or maintained. You can minimize these chances by making sure that your oven door closes properly and that your door’s safety devices (that prevent microwaves from being produced when the door is open) work correctly. Also, you should make sure that the seals to your door and oven are clean and intact. If your oven is damaged in any way, you should not use it until it has been repaired by an appropriately qualified service engineer.
If you are still worried or want to be cautious, you can also just watch your food cook from further away. This will reduce your exposures to radiation from your microwave substantially. Happy cooking!
Previous Ask Treehugger columns can be found here.
Helen Suh MacIntosh is a professor in environmental health at Harvard University and studies how pollution behaves in the environment and how it affects people's health. Please keep in mind that her answers are just her interpretation of available information and should not be taken as the only viewpoint or solution to a problem. Use this column at your own risk. Having said this, please feel free to post any of your environmental health questions to AskTreeHugger [[@]] TreeHugger [[.]] com (please use a descriptive email subject line and mention if you want to remain anonymous or not).
Microwave oven's are not healthy. They kill all the nutrients in your food. Try microwaving water and than letting it cool to water plants with. I bet they won't live long after being watered with that for a few weeks. There was a lawsuit in 1991 in Oklahoma. A woman named Norma Levitt had hip surgery, but was killed by a simple blood transfusion when a nurse "warmed the blood for the transfusion in a microwave oven!" Microwaving changes molecules in anything you cook/heat inside of it. I suggest you use great caution when microwaving and if possible don't use it at all. Google the dangers of microwaving sometime and you will see. Cell phones and cordless phones also produce radiation. As do digital alarm clocks next to your bed. But anyways... I will let you believe what you want and I suggest doing some research. Check out the Russian's and microwave ovens. They were banned over there before Perestroika because they knew how horrible and dangerous they are to your health.
Sleeping with your head next to a digital alarm clock or voltage transformer ("wall wart") is about the worst electromagnetic exposure you can get. 6 to 8 hours in direct exposure is seriously bad compared to a few minutes in front of a microwave oven.
PS: I have a milligaus meter. My microwave exceeds 10mG within 6 inches of the door seal, and falls off to ambient within three feet. Common sense is to stand back.
How does the radiation from a digital alarm clock compare to a cell phone left on at night? I use the alarm on my cell phone and sometimes have it near my bed. Also, what is considered close to the bed/your head in this case--1 foot, 2ft, does it matter significantly?
Several years ago my friend and a holder of several Doctorates in Science, was involved in intensive testing of Microwaves and their effect on human health. 'Cellphones' were one of the specific items being researched. Sandia Laboratories in Albuquerque NM were the facilities used. The tests used intensities far in excess to the actual radiation emited under normal circumstances.
The endless generations of micro organisms in petri dishes, and every conceivable organism with countless generations (think fruit flies) over many years were observed. The end result was no noticeable deviations in the process of cell divisions other than the rate of normal random occurances.
Most of the 'Media hype' was just that, with unsubstantiated claims from vague sources, which builds a following of beleivers that continue their myths until ingrained in the minds of individuals as fact. A human trait, also ingrained in our brain, over which we have little control. In other words.... 'Whatever' .....as my kids replied, when I would try to inform them of any true proven facts.
http://daflikkers.blogspot.com/
Crystal:
"A woman named Norma Levitt had hip surgery, but was killed by a simple blood transfusion when a nurse "warmed the blood for the transfusion in a microwave oven!" Microwaving changes molecules in anything you cook/heat inside of it."
You do understand that the point of a blood transfusion is to give your body additional blood cells to utilize, right? If you kill the cells first, they can't be expected to work anymore.
All cooking methods change the molecules within food. That's the whole point of cooking!
Crystal, that's got to be one of the worst examples of FUD I've ever seen on the Internet. Care to explain to us how microwaved water is different than plain old water? Less hydrogen or oxygen? Do you have any scientific data that backs up any of your claims?
As for your transfusion story: http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/weblog/permalink/microwave_cooking_is_killing_you/
The reason you should just stand back is because the intensity of the radiation decreases with distance. More area to cover with the same amount of radiation, means less intensity. Basically how any radiation works, wall warts or otherwise.
This is just cut and pasted from Wikipedia
Heating of living tissue
The thermally sensitive nerve cells, specifically in humans, are situated in the outer layer of the skin. Microwaves have a deeper heat penetration depth than regular heat, viz. convection, conduction or infrared radiation. This means that in an extreme case a subject could receive a harmful temperature increase in its tissues, without being aware of the danger. The classic example is microwave damage to the lens of the eye, which has poor circulation and no internal receptors for temperature or pain. Permanent retinal damage may result from pressing one's face against the microwave, as a field may penetrate a short distance out from the door's protective mesh.
It sounds like you would have to be pretty stupid to get your eyes that close, but could happen. I trust treehugger on stuff like this, and think that any significant danger would have come out.
And yes, all cooking produces chemical changes, and kills anything in it, which is the main reason humans cook things.
The best protection against deadly electromagnetic radiation emitted by AC adaptors, microwave ovens, and Republicans, is wearing a very inexpensive, yet highly effective tinfoil hat.
Microwaved water and plants.
http://www.snopes.com/science/microwave/plants.asp
All electromagnet radiation falls off in intensity with the inverse square of distance...so like Justin says, pretty dramatically over space. By my measurement, at my personal bedside, the intensity of my 2-person Radio Shack model alarm clock is such that if I can just reach it with outstretched hand, the mG level on my pillow is within ambient. So, no need to change your furniture nor to crawl out of bed. Just slide 'er over a bit.
If you can just barely reach that distance to the wall wart by your bed you'll be fine. The situation that is BAD is when the recepticle is right behind your head on the wall. Get a power strip and remove the exposure by lowering the wart to the floor.
Wow, this posting reminds of an old co-worker of mine. Her husband was rather mistrusting of the safety of many things including microwaves and insisted that whenever in front of the microwave she hold her hands over her breasts to shield them from cancer. while personally i don't understand the need to stand in front of the microwave (it's not a stove, you don't need to stir!), I'd guess that if it is as dangerous as he thinks, her hands aren't going to stop cancer! maybe if she wore some nifty tinfoil gloves... Also, to anonymous who cut & pasted from wikipedia, and everyone who trusts wikipedia - if you, I or that idiot George Bush can edit what Wikipedia says, do you really believe that it's a factual source? I admit to reading it, but you can't necessarily believe what it says!
If microwave ovens are safe, why are there disclaimers on baby formula about NOT heating it up in microwaves? Same thing for breast milk, you're not supposed to heat it up in microwaves. Is it because it heats up too fast and nukes the nutrients?
Not being a radiation specialist, I don't know about the safety of microwave ovens. I would like to comment, however, on Crystals claim
"A woman named Norma Levitt had hip surgery, but was killed by a simple blood transfusion when a nurse "warmed the blood for the transfusion in a microwave oven!" Microwaving changes molecules in anything you cook/heat inside of it."
Though it seems incredible stupid to warm a blood transfusion in a microwave oven, Ms. Norma Levitt did not die from the transfusion. A closer look at the document of the case (which can be found here: http://wyomcases.courts.state.wy.us/applications/oscn/DeliverDocument.asp?citeID=4387 ) reveals : "The defendants argued that Levitt died from a blood clot" (see the 'facts' section of the document).
IMHO, it can be concluded that even though microwaving food will certainly NOT make your food healthier, it is not going to poison it either.
[I am aware that this is rather a side note than a contribution to whether or not you should stand in front of the microwave.]
The warning for baby formula is because most of the time the formula is heated unevenly. Thus if you nuke it, test it and it seems okay, the baby can still be burned by too-hot formula.
Is in dangerous: maybe only if you literally hug the microwave.
The poor man's test is to simply hold a metal fork/knife plat against the front of the microwave or edges of the door. If the metal gets warm at all, you have a leak. If not, stop worrying about it.
For those of you who don't get why one would stand by the microwave: I stand by the microwave because many of my microwave recipes call for a change in power once they reach a boil. In addition, microwaves cook food so fast, it can burn or boil over if you don't pay attention.
I don't use the microwave too much, because I think the stove renders a better result. However, I do use it to warm up the water for my Aeropress espresso maker and the latte I make from that espresso. I don't seriously believe this will do anything bad to my health. After all, it's ultimately mostly water. I also use it to warm up leftovers that lend themselves well to the microwave (cooked grains, steamed vegetables, pasta in sauce, etc). I believe that it lowers the nutrients, but I don't have time to cook a fresh meal every night. And whatever is left in my usual low-fat fare is much better than what would be in fast food, which is often cooked in the microwave anyway.
This seems more like health than the environment in my opinion. If it helps get things back on track, is the microwave more efficient than other methods in heating foods? For the water, you're allowed to include a Bunn Coffee Brewer or an electric kettle.
Tim,
When we got an electric kettle we asked the same question, which was more efficient? The kettle and our microwave are both listed as using 1500 watts, and the kettle boiled 2 cups of water in just over half the time as the microwave. So we're going with the kettle being more efficient--assuming reasonably accurate labeling and that we only heat up the amount of water we need.
The kettle is more efficient. It has an electric resistor which converts all of the incoming electricity into heat, this goes almost completely into the water.
Microwaves have internal electronics (power transformers, magnetron tube, blowers and fans for cooling, motors for the turntable, lights) in which some of the incoming energy is lost. Usually about 60% of the energy going into a microwave oven ends up in the food, so yes that correlates nicley with the 'just over half the time' it took to boil the water in the microwave.
This is in comparison with the stove top where most of the energy is lost around the sides of the pots and pans. Gas stoves are the most wasteful, since they produce combustion gases (esp. water vapor) that carry away heat. Of course with anything electric, there's the fact that if it was made in a steam plant (fossil, biomass, or nuclear), only 33% of the fuel burned is turned into electrical energy.
Everything kills you. I remember an old George Carlin riff that goes something like this: Authorities are now reporting that toothpaste kills you, but only if swallowed in minute amounts over a period of many decades.....
Enjoy.
A particularly salient point strikes me in the excellent Snopes article:
http://www.snopes.com/science/microwave/plants.asp
"2. The container used to store or boil the microwaved water could have introduced a residual substance into the water that hindered plant growth."
Indeed, if a "microwave safe" plastic container was used to heat the water in the plant experiment, it would have likely introduced a terrible kind of toxin into the plant's water.
(likewise with I.V. bags)
Called "monomers", they are basically free radicals released when plastic is heated. Microwaving plastic and food together will promote the introduction of these nasty chemicals into your food.
Never microwave plastics!
LOL that first comment up top seems to be
a stream of urban myths :D I'm sure microwave
ovens are more dangerous than they let on though,
it can't be good for you to get hit with a stray microwave.
Plus I'm pretty nervous about all the times I've heated
my coffee in those things and looked all close
into the glass door. They should be solid steel,
with no glass doors, if they leak. what's that all about?
That seems like lobbyist type bullshit to me.
desidero sapere ilcosto del forno a microonde contv