{"id":"HHS-OASH-2026-0397-1830","number":"1830","name":"Meri Fdez","organization":"","posted":"2026-10-07T04:00Z","received":"2026-10-07T04:00Z","body":"I have experienced symptoms that I identify as electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) for approximately ten years. In the past, my condition was considerably more severe than it is today.\nI am currently doing much better, but this needs to be understood in the context of the way I have adapted my daily life to maintain very low exposure to electromagnetic fields. I try to live with minimal exposure in order to avoid returning to the severe condition I experienced previously. Maintaining this low-exposure baseline now allows me to tolerate occasional exposures, such as going to restaurants or traveling, generally with fewer consequences than in the past.\nIn my experience, Wi-Fi exposure is associated with headaches and tension or pain in my neck and shoulders. When I hold or use a mobile phone or tablet, I experience tingling sensations in my hands. These symptoms occur during exposure and gradually decrease after the exposure ends. The time required for them to subside varies depending on the exposure.\nIn the past, I lived in an apartment with a telecommunications antenna directly in front of it. While I lived there, my symptoms were persistent rather than occurring only during occasional exposures. At that time, I experienced headaches, neck and shoulder tension or pain, insomnia, fatigue, anxiety, and episodes involving symptoms that I now recognize as compatible with mast cell activation, although this had not been diagnosed at the time. This situation was one of the reasons I eventually decided to move.\nAfter moving and substantially reducing my everyday exposure, my improvement was slow and gradual, not immediate. Over time, however, I improved considerably. I continue to maintain a very low-exposure home environment. I believe this is important to mention because looking only at my current level of symptoms could give an incomplete picture: reducing exposure is part of how I organize my life in order to remain stable.\nI cannot establish from my personal experience alone that RF/EMF exposure caused my symptoms, nor can I prove that reducing exposure caused my improvement. What I can report is an approximately ten-year history in which I have repeatedly observed a temporal association between certain exposures and the onset of symptoms, a gradual reduction in symptoms after exposure ends, and long-term improvement while living in a low-exposure environment.\nI believe research into the potential health effects of RF/EMF exposure should include people who report persistent symptoms temporally associated with exposure, particularly individuals who may currently appear recovered or much less affected because they have substantially modified their environment.\nIf research considers only current symptom severity without documenting the exposure-reduction or avoidance measures a person uses, important information may be missed.\nI also believe it is important to investigate the timing between exposure and symptom onset, recovery time after exposure ends, the effects of continuous or repeated exposure, and whether maintaining a low-exposure environment over long periods changes an individual's response to subsequent occasional exposures","attachments":[],"attachment_inventory":true,"withheld":false,"source":"https://www.regulations.gov/comment/HHS-OASH-2026-0397-1830","tags":["health-experiences","sleep-cognition","exposure-places","research-evidence"],"source_hash":"fc006896bba17dfa841a9465aba5bbbd1458956d23e18ad0e64ad585a89bde4b","slug":"health-experiences-comment-1830","classification":{"id":"HHS-OASH-2026-0397-1830","body_sha256":"f72367d2ef268cd9fa9cc808515eab71402deec07a793548d2894a9e591428b9","status":"ai_reviewed","primary_topic":"ehs","topics":[{"id":"ehs","evidence":"have experienced symptoms that I identify as electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) for approximately ten years. In the past, my con"},{"id":"neurological","evidence":"xperience, Wi-Fi exposure is associated with headaches and tension or pain in my neck and shoulders. When I h"},{"id":"wifi","evidence":"equences than in the past.\nIn my experience, Wi-Fi exposure is associated with headaches and tension or p"},{"id":"infrastructure","evidence":"\nIn the past, I lived in an apartment with a telecommunications antenna directly in front of it. While I lived there, my sympt"},{"id":"access","evidence":"ituation was one of the reasons I eventually decided to move.\nAfter moving and substantially reducing my everyday e"},{"id":"research","evidence":"substantially modified their environment.\nIf research considers only current symptom severity without documenting the exposure-reduction or avoidanc"}],"summary":"Reports a decade of EHS symptoms and gradual improvement with lower exposure, explicitly acknowledges uncertain causation, and asks studies to document avoidance measures and symptom timing.","reviewed_at":"2026-10-07T16:33:06Z","review_method":"Complete published comment-body review; exact prior-reviewed body matches reuse source-supported reviews with each distinct official ID preserved. Attachments and external links not reviewed.","review_source_sha256":"d13846079476530eeb87cca3885dcced592c6732fff6d3a6286120df1bb763f5","source_url":"https://rfsafe.net/hhs-comments/data/catalog.json","scope":"Original comment body; attachments excluded"},"forum_topics":["ehs","neurological","wifi","infrastructure","access","research"],"primary_topic":"ehs","forum_title":"Reports a decade of EHS symptoms and gradual improvement with lower exposure, explicitly acknowledges unc…"}