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Dr. David Carpenter

Dr. David Carpenter

public health physician, director, institute for health and environment at the university of albany
  • bio

    David O. Carpenter is a public health physician whose current position is Director of the Institute for Health and the Environment at the University at Albany, as well as Professor of Environmental Health Sciences within the School of Public Health at the University at Albany. After receiving his MD degree from Harvard Medical School, he chose a career in research and public health.

    When he arrived in Albany in 1980 as the Director of the Wadsworth Laboratories of the New York State Department of Health, he was given the responsibility for administering a program to determine whether there were adverse human health effects of electromagnetic fields (EMFs), initiated because of concern about hazards from high voltage powerlines. A 5 million dollar research program was begun, and when finished in 1987 the program concluded that while there were effects of EMFs on many organ systems, a particular concern was an increased incidence of leukemia in children living in a home with elevated magnetic fields. After that time, Dr. Carpenter became for the spokesperson for New York State on issues related to EMFs. He has continued to evaluate research in this area and has edited two books and written several review articles on the subject. He testified before the President’s Cancer Panel in 2009 on human health effects of both power line and radio frequency EMFs from a variety of sources, particularly from cell phones. He is the Co-Editor of the Bioinitiative Report, published first in 2007 and revised in 2012. This is a comprehensive review of the effects of EMFs.