The whole world and its dog are getting very wound up by an AP special report stating implanting radio-frequency identification (RFID) microchips into living tissue could cause cancer. In the dog’s case this is probably justifiable as the evidence is currently limited to animals, and putting the chips in humans is still pretty much experimental, though in concept it has been approved by the FDA. Widespread coverage of the new report sent stocks in their manufacturer VeriChip plummeting (The Ottawa Citizen).
The chips have a number of uses or potential uses, such as tracking pets and products in supermarkets, providing easier access to patient information, and as implanted credit cards. But according to AP, animal studies dating back to the mid-1990s show implants induced malignant tumours in lab mice and rats. “The transponders were the cause of the tumors,” Keith Johnson, retired toxicologic pathologist and member of one of the study teams, said. ‘Leading cancer specialists’ who looked at the research for AP said the findings “troubled them”. Not as much, I’m guessing, as they are now troubling the 2,000 people who have been implanted with the things (regardless of how weak the evidence may be).
It is worth noting that none of the studies referenced by AP are new; whether they were reviewed by the FDA before it approved the chips is unclear. There’s also a row brewing over the fact that Tommy Thompson, then US Secretary of Health and Human Services, supported the approval of microchip technology for humans, then joined VeriChip (see Google News Comment). The catalyst for the story (according to Wired) was a French bulldog that died of cancer after being implanted with a RFID chip.
Over on Denialism, self-professed anti-RFID blogger Mark Hoofnagle says: “RFID didn’t need any more help being creepy. But two things should be considered before this becomes a major concern. First, is that enough of these have been implanted in dogs and cats that it strikes me as strange that this has not been observed yet in the pet population … Second this result would be surprising since one would not predict the types of materials used in implantable chips would cause inflammation or be carcinogenic (unless someone screwed up), so it is unclear what the mechanism would be for carcinogenicity.”
VeriChip has responded: “The article and the alleged research cited make no link whatsoever to malignant tumor formation from microchips in humans. As the article states, research protocol guidelines clearly indicate that making such a link from mice to humans is a very big leap. … It is important to note this report was not a controlled, scientific study, rather it was a report of a single dog that presented with a tumor, and therefore it should not be inferred that the microchip caused the tumor without further study.”
Image: Verichip