After reviewing medical evidence, Italy’s Supreme Court has ruled that mobile phones can cause brain tumors. It’s a landmark legal decision that experts say could open the floodgates for personal-injury and class-action lawsuits against cellphone companies around the world.
The ruling is based on a case brought by a 60-year-old Italian businessman, Innocente Marcolini, who developed a non-malignant brain tumor that his lawyers argued was caused by long hours on his mobile phone – estimated at up to six hours a day for 12 years.
Italy's high court ruled that there was a “causal link” between Marcolini’s phone use and his tumor based, in part on expert testimony provided by oncologist Angelo Gino Levis and neurosurgeon Giuseppe Grasso.
“This is significant for very many people,” Marcolini said in an interview following the ruling. “I wanted this problem to become public, because many people still do not know the risks.
“I was on the phone, usually the mobile, for at least five or six hours every day at work. I wanted it recognized that there was a link between my illness and the use of mobile and cordless phones. Parents need to know their children are at risk of this illness.”
Dr. Levis added that the case provides precedent-setting legal grounds to support the argument that electromagnetic radiation emitted by mobile and cordless phones can damage cells, making tumors more likely.
