Neil Dring was an exemplary police officer, the sort that every force and community would wish for. He was very popular with his colleagues and admired and respected by the people of the City of Leicester whom he served. He in turn loved his work and the camaraderie of the force that he was proud to be part of.

Neil was an active sportsman and triathlete, and kept himself very fit. He didn’t smoke, nor was he a drinker, and up until nine or ten months ago his health was excellent. He was a great Dad to his little girl and was looking forward to being a great Dad to his second child.

Around ten months ago, shortly before that child was born, Neil was diagnosed as having Oesophageal Cancer. He was able to enjoy only about one month with his newborn son before the illness began to make any sort of normal life a virtual impossibility for Neil and his family.

Neil had none of the preconditions for this sort of cancer, which is much more of a risk for smokers and those who drink regularly. He didn’t suffer from the condition known as ‘acid reflux’, which can also increase one’s susceptibility. Authoritative sources state that “Oesophageal Cancer is most commonly found in those over 60, but can be contracted by adults between the ages of 45 and 75”.

Neil was 38 years old when he died.

One thing that Neil did suffer from for a while before being diagnosed with cancer – virtually ever since he had started using the ‘Airwave’ communications system, in fact – was severe headaches. He himself stated his conviction that both the headaches and the cancer that eventually killed him could be traced to the handset that he wore mounted on his chest every day – directly over where the cancer appeared - with an earpiece wired inside his helmet as he carried out his motorcycle patrol duties around Leicester.

Two hundred police officers attended Neil’s funeral. His coffin was carried on a police motorcycle side-car, accompanied by an escort of police motorcycle outriders. Two officers delivered glowing tributes at the service, telling of “A great guy who commanded total respect and never let you down”.

Neil’s brother Ian was, along with the rest of the family, with Neil when he died. Ian told me:

“If people want to know how it feels to have your brother die in your arms, fighting for 48 hours for every breath, then I’ll tell them - he was a person of great courage and integrity - it was a death you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy.”

Neil’s nine-month old son is beginning to learn to speak quite clearly now [July 2004]. I’m told Neil and Ian always looked very similar, so when Ian walked into the room shortly after Neil’s death the little lad called out “Dad!”

There’s no-one to answer that call now …

Heartfelt condolences go out to Neil’s family from all who are committed to preventing such occurrences. By agreeing that his story may be told, his family have ensured that through his death many other officers may be saved from a similar fate.
The facts speak for themselves, they cannot be silenced.

That’s by no means all. Another officer in the same force is suffering from exactly the same condition in the same place. This second case was diagnosed just weeks after Neil’s illness was confirmed.

This officer also was not that long turned 40 before he was diagnosed. Also a non-smoker, non-drinker, this officer, too, was a keen athlete and a good runner. He, too, is now in an advanced stage of an illness for which he had none of the preconditions.

[It’s worth noting that in Leicestershire, as in most parts of the country, police stations and offices have TETRA antennae on the roof of the building. All police officers and civilian staff are subject to the radiation from those antennae - as are members of the public in the vicinity.]

[Update 28th August ‘04: It’s also worth noting this PRESS RELEASE from just a few days ago giving the view of the US & Canadian FireFighters’ Association on ‘masts on the roof’.

These guys are no wimps - remember the heroes of 9/11? - but they don’t want masts on their roofs.
And they have solid scientific reasons for feeling that way - see the brain scan info.]

Cancer research specialists tell us that the likelihood of a person under 40 contracting oesophageal cancer is one in a hundred thousand. It’s fair to assume that this cancer at such an early age would apply virtually exclusively to those whose oesophagus (throat) has regularly suffered from some form of irritation over a long period – smoking, drinking, acid reflux from the stomach. This would almost certainly be so in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred at such an exceptionally early age.

Good science always underplays, rather than overplaying, exceptional circumstances. So for the purpose of a brief analysis we’ll assume that the odds of a person contracting this condition at a very early age without any of the preconditions are one-twentieth, rather than one hundredth, of that “one in a hundred thousand”.

This puts the probability of someone like Neil Dring or his colleague contracting this condition – by chance - at around one in two million.

The Leicestershire force consists of two thousand officers. Applying standard statistical techniques, the likelihood of two such officers in that force both being diagnosed with this condition within the same twelve months is, as it happens, also around one in two million.

This means that one could watch a group the size of the Leicestershire police force for a million years and still only have a roughly evens chance of seeing such an occurrence…

… IF it happened by chance.

This is exactly the type of condition that was predicted by Barrie Trower in his Report on TETRA for the Police Federation two years ago. It also corresponds very closely with an incidence of cancer suffered by a Crime Scene Investigator with another force who was using TETRA.
[Update 28/8/04: Official sources have now confirmed that another Lancashire police officer has since died of throat cancer - see this report on Starweave website.]

It’s likely that colleagues of these officers will be asking some pretty searching questions of their superiors, questions to which every serving police officer deserves answers.

These could include the following:

1) In the light of the Stewart Report (IEGMP, 2000) recommending avoidance of amplitude modulation around 16 Hz, based on research evidence of biological effects at levels too low to cause heating, why are police officers throughout the UK being obliged to use equipment that pulses at 17.6 Hz? How can ‘safety guidelines’ based only on short-term heating effects be used to justify this policy?

2) Why did the Minister for Policing say in a Commons Debate on Tetra, July 10th 2003, with reference specifically to the above research studies:

"The experiments were carried out in the 1970s and it has since been virtually impossible to replicate them."

when the fact is that the Report listed four studies in the eighties and one in the nineties confirming this effect? Also the NRPB Report on TETRA (2001) listed just one further study - another successful replication in 1999, just five years ago, giving a two-to-one majority (8-4) of studies in those two reports showing this effect.

3) Why did the Home Office's own claimed 'attempt to replicate' this effect in the Government's own laboratories at DSTL Porton Down specifically not test at the power levels at which this effect was observed in previous research? Why also did this Home Office study not take into consideration two other factors which previous researchers had explicitly indicated as highly significant - i.e. background static magnetic field (possibly affected by e.g. steel lab benches) and temperature?

How can the Home Office claim this was a true 'replication attempt'?

4) Given the clear need for the Police to have a secure, reliable and safe state-of-the-art communications system, why did the Home Office place an order for Airwave without consideration of other less potentially harmful systems, such as TETRAPOL?

Lastly, a word on that question ‘Was this the first TETRA death’? To me, it’s not a question of whether this death was caused by a TETRA handset - for me that’s not in doubt.

No, the question is whether this is in fact the first such death. It’s well known that the authorities have pulled a veil of silence over this whole issue, making it very difficult for officers to speak out about it. By doing this they are, of course, simply encouraging everyone to assume the worst (and my bet is that everyone won’t be far wrong). It’s certainly not beyond the bounds of possibility that there have been other deaths elsewhere that have been ’hushed up’.

One thing that is absolutely certain: as long as this system continues, there will be more.

Grahame Blackwell

“... And after all the troubles and ills, the last thing out of Pandora’s Box was Hope.”

If his death has alerted people to the dangers of an untested technology,

then Neil Dring has not died in vain.

Update 25th November 2004

In the last couple of weeks Leicestershire police force has seen four further significant events related to the story below:

(1) A second Leicestershire police officer has died of oesophageal cancer (referred to in the text below as suffering from this condition);

(2) A third Leicestershire officer has recently had a tumour removed from his oesophagus (declared nonmalignant); yet another with a healthy life-style: non-smoker, non-drinker with no known preconditions - just 26 years old.

The statistical likelihood of three such cases in a force of 2000 is conservatively estimated at one in several billion.

(3) The Deputy Chief Constable of Leicestershire Constabulary has acknowledged the existence of “a cluster” of cases - see news story HERE;

(4) Dr Ian Dring, brother of the deceased officer referred to in the article below, and officers from the Leicestershire force, attended a presentation giving the official view on the Tetra health issue - which was regarded by some there as a clear attempt to cover up, rather than address, a serious problem. See report on this event HERE.

One interesting fact that did come out of this presentation was that the hand-sets used by the Leicestershire force have a considerably higher SAR rating than those used by some other forces [SAR = Specific Absorption Rate, the rate at which energy from the handset is absorbed by the head or body]. The more-than-double rate of absorption from the Leicestershire handsets could explain why they have experienced more ill-health effects more rapidly than other forces. ‘Sepura’ on the handset could mean that the user is at substantially greater - or at least earlier - risk than a ‘Motorola’ label.

One disturbing feature of the presentation was when, in answer to the question “Would you use an Airwave Tetra handset”, all on the official presentation panel nodded obediently - including the researcher from Imperial College who is supposedly conducting studies to confirm whether or not Airwave is in fact safe. Yes, great, very reassuring - but would you want your life to depend on ‘unbiased’ research by a guy who appears to have already made up his mind what the outcome will be?

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