On December 15, the Ministry of Justice registered an order of the Ministry of Health developed together with the BRDO and the “Telas”, which amends the Health and Safety Regulations. Approved electromagnetic radiation of base stations of mobile communication operators remains at the level of 10 mW/cm2 that will allow operators to significantly reduce the time of deployment of 4G communication networks in Ukraine in 2018.
Amendments to Health and Safety Regulations take into account the “wishes” of the NGO “Institute of Public Health” set forth in their legal claim.
As a reminder, earlier the Ministry of Health has approved the hard-won order “On Approval of Amendments to the State Health and Safety Regulations and Rules for Protecting the Population from Electromagnetic Radiation Effects” developed with the support of BRDO experts and the Ukrainian Communication Operators Association Telas. This order increased the permissible level of electromagnetic radiation of base stations of mobile communication operators by 4 times (up to 10 mW/cm2) and excluded the term of “sanitary passport” from Health and Safety Regulations.
However, the NGO “Institute of Public Health” filed the lawsuit and, on December 7, 2017, the Kyiv Administrative Court of Appeal granted the NGO’s request and, actually, suspended the effect of the order of the Ministry of Health until the completion of the case. After that, the Ministry of Health together with the BRDO and the “Telas” developed a new order, which includes amendments on the basis of NGO’s “wishes” set forth in the lawsuit. The new draft order of the Ministry of Health was approved by all interested bodies and registered in the Ministry of Justice.
The BRDO Office also believes that mobile operators are not obliged to receive sanitary passports for radio-technical facilities, since they are not included in the “List of Permits in the Field of Economic Activity” approved by the law of Ukraine. Operators themselves meet radiation standards specified in the Health and Safety Regulations and still obtain sanitary passports on their own initiative if necessary: for example, in the case of complaints from the population.