On January 13, 2020, Turin’s Court of Appeals confirmed a 2017 decision determining that a former Telecom Italia worker’s acoustic neuroma (a benign tumor in the ear) was caused by his mobile phone use. This is the sixth time that an Italian court has affirmed a causal link between cell phone use and brain tumors, including decisions by the High Court of Italy.
The Appellate court reached its decision after a review of the evidence and after receiving the opinion of two court-appointed experts. The experts referred the court to studies indicating that individuals who speak on their phones for an average of 30 minutes a day for at least 10 years increase their risk of developing head tumors. After considering this evidence, the Appellate court in Turin stated, “There are solid elements to affirm a causal role between the exposure of the person to radiofrequencies from mobile phones and the disease that arose.”