Director of the Wireless and EMF Program at Environmental Health Sciences.
Current Role and Expertise
Theodora Scarato is Director of the Wireless and EMF Program at Environmental Health Sciences (EHS) and a nationally recognized expert in environmental health policy related to cell towers, wireless radiation, and electromagnetic fields (EMF). She has co-authored several scientific papers on EMF, health, and environment, and also serves as a Special Expert to the International Commission on the Biological Effects of Electromagnetic Fields (ICBE-EMF).
Leadership in FCC Oversight and Landmark Federal Litigation
Having previously long served as Executive Director of Environmental Health Trust, Scarato played a lead role in its landmark federal case against the FCC in which the court mandated the agency explain how its 1996 cell tower radiation exposure guidelines were adequate. She has filed 1000 scientific submissions to the FCC and is involved in current efforts to get the FCC to respond to the 2021 DC Circuit Court mandate, as she is also an individual petitioner in the case.
Scarato’s work at Environmental Health Sciences bridges the latest scientific evidence with public policy, concluding the urgent need to reassess and update government cell tower and cell phone radiation exposure limits so that they are science-based and implement environmental safeguards.
Scientific Publications on Cell Tower and Wireless Radiation, Public Health and Environment
Her 2025 paper, “U.S. policy on wireless technologies and public health protection: regulatory gaps and proposed reforms,” published in the journal Frontiers in Public Health, is a foundational paper on how and why U.S. policy on cell towers and cell phone radiation is inadequately protective. She chronicles how the EPA lost funding and safety standards were never developed decades ago, and then documents the current lack of regulatory oversight and accountability. The paper details some of her hundreds of Freedom of Information requests to U.S. government agencies, which revealed the FCC had withheld its laboratory findings that cell phones exceed limits at body contact and that CDC webpages were drafted with the help of a wireless industry consultant. She also provides an overview of key regulatory deficiencies, such as the lack of pre-market safety testing and post-market medical surveillance with key recommendations for reform.
She also co-authored a review paper with U.S. experts on the impacts to wildlife and habitat entitled Flora and fauna—How nonhuman species interact with natural and man-made EMF at ecosystem levels and public policy recommendations which documents how all nations’ regulations are focused almost exclusively on protecting humans, while ignoring nonhuman species and their habitats. It concludes with a call for regulatory reform to explicitly consider wildlife and ecosystems, with special attention to bees and other pollinators, which can absorb proportionally higher levels of radiation and are particularly vulnerable to EMF exposure.
Bridging Science, Public Health, and Policy Reform
Scarato has delivered numerous presentations in the U.S. and internationally, including at the National Institutes of Health Health in Buildings Roundtable, the Experts Forum at Yale Medical School, the University of California, San Francisco, and the American Public Health Association Conference. She has also coordinated several scientific conferences, including the first major medical conference training doctors on non-ionizing EMFs.
Her research contributions are helping shift national awareness toward the health, ecological, and regulatory consequences of rapidly expanding wireless infrastructure.
Stay updated with her work via LinkedIn, the EHS newsletter for the latest factsheets, science and policy news, and the ICBE-EMF newsletter for the commission’s newest scientific publications.
SELECTED SCIENTIFIC PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS
Scarato T (2025) U.S. policy on wireless technologies and public health protection: regulatory gaps and proposed reforms. Frontiers in Public Health 13:1677583
Levitt, B. B., Lai, H. C., Manville, A. M., II, & Scarato, T. (2025). The 4th International Expert Forum on the Public Health and Environmental Impacts of Cellular and Wireless Radiation Exposure 2024 at Yale Medical School Flora and fauna—How nonhuman species interact with natural and man-made EMF at ecosystem levels and public policy recommendations. Frontiers in Public Health, 13.
Melnick, R.L., Moskowitz, J.M., Héroux, P., Mallery-Blythe, E., McCredden, J., Herbert. M., Hardell, L., Philips, A., Belpoggi, F., Frank, J., Scarato, T., Kelley, E., On Behalf of the International Commission on the Biological Effects of Electromagnetic Fields (ICBE-EMF), The WHO-commissioned systematic reviews on health effects of radiofrequency radiation provide no assurance of safety. Environmental Health 24, 70 (2025).
Ben Ishai Paul, Baldwin Hillel Z, Birnbaum Linda S, Butler Tom, Chamberlin Kent, Davis Devra L, Scarato Theodora, Taylor Hugh, Applying the Precautionary Principle to Wireless Technology: Policy Dilemmas and Systemic Risks. Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development. 2024
Davis D, Birnbaum L, Ben-Ishai P, Taylor H, Sears M, Butler T, Scarato T. Wireless technologies, non-ionizing electromagnetic fields and children: Identifying and reducing health risks. Curr Probl Pediatr Adolesc Health Care. 2023
Clegg, Frank M., et al. “Building Science and Radiofrequency Radiation: What Makes Smart and Healthy Buildings.” Building and Environment, 2020
BOOK CHAPTERS
Catherine Dodd and Theodora Scarato. “A new form of environmental pollution: Wireless and non-ionizing electromagnetic fields.” Environmental Health in Nursing, 2nd Edition, edited by Ruth McDermott-Levy, Kathryn P. Jackman-Murphy, Jeanne Leffers, Adelita G. Cantu, Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments, 2022
Theodora Scarato. “How to protect yourself, your family, and your community.” Chapter 15 in Disconnect: A Scientist’s Solutions for Safer Technology. Devra L. Davis, 2024
SELECTED CONFERENCES, PRESENTATIONS, AND SYMPOSIUMS
Yale University Medical School, Environmental Health Trust, 2024
“U.S. Federal Regulation of Wireless Radiation, A Case Study in Regulatory Gaps”
4th International Expert Forum on the Public Health and Environmental Impacts of Cellular and Wireless Radiation,
Digital Media and Developing Minds Scientific Congress 2023
Children and Screens: Institute of Digital Media and Child Development
“U.S. and International Law and Policy to Address Children and Cell Phone Radiation Health Issues”
American Public Health Association Annual Conference, 2023
“The Case for Mitigating Wireless Radiation in the School Setting as Primary Prevention”
American Public Health Association Annual Conference, 2023
“The Regulation of Wireless Radiation in the United States: Exemplar of a Regulatory Gap”
Wireless Impacts to Wildlife and the Environment: Science, Policy and Law, 2023
“Wildlife and Wildlife: A Critical Regulatory Gap”,
State of the Science Expert Symposium: Avoidable Environmental Health Risks for Children and their Families
State of the Science: Environmental Health Risks from Plastics to Cell Phone Radiation, Jackson Hole Wyoming, 2022
“Public Health and Policy Update on Wireless Radiation and Children”
Jonas Nursing & Veterans Healthcare, 2022
Wireless Radiation- What Environmental Health Leaders Need to Know,
“Children’s Health, Wireless and Policy”
Henley University, England, 2021, 2022, 2023
“False Advertising? The Marketing Cell Phones and 5G”
Guest Lecture, The Dark Side of Marketing Course,
Tel Aviv University
International Expert Forum: Wireless and Cell Phone Radiation and Public Policy, 2020
“How Do Governments Address the Health Issues Posed by Cell Phones Wi-Fi and 5G?”
New Hampshire State 5G Commission
“5G, Cell Towers and Wireless: Policy and Science Update”
Invited Expert, Minutes, PPT, Final Report, 2020
San Francisco State University
“Health Risks of Wireless Radiation” Digital Living: Promises and Perils Conference, 2020
American Federation of Teachers National Conference
“Technology and Environmental Health: Increasing Awareness and Improving Safety for Teachers, Staff and Students” Washington DC, 2019
University of San Francisco, California
“U.S. and International Policy Updates on 5G and Cell Towers”
2019
San Francisco Teachers Union Seminar
“Enhancing Technology Safety in San Francisco United School District”
San Francisco California, 2019
University of Patras, Greece
2nd International Conference, “The Dramatic Changes on the Planet and the Hellenic Roots of Ecological Ethics” 2018
Health in Buildings Roundtable Conference, National Institutes of Health
“Emerging Technologies, Health and Policy” 2018
Michigan State House Briefing
“State and Local Policy on 5G, Small Cells and Wireless”
5G Wireless Technology Forum, Organized by State Senator Patrick Colbeck, 2018
Hebrew University Medical School
International Conference “U.S. and International Policy Developments /Medical Recommendations on Children”
The Israel Institute for Advanced Study and the Environmental Health Trust, 2017
Environmental Health Trust Science and Policy Conference Teton County Wyoming
“International Policy Updates Related to Cell Phones and Wireless Radiation”
Dialogue with the Doctors About Cell Phones, Wireless and Your Health: A Scientific Update with Practical Recommendations, 2017