5G OR NOT 5G?

According to viral memes that you may have seen, mobile phone signals (and especially the newer 5G variety), are deadly to bees. Spoiler, they’re really not. The science is clear, proven and adamant that since mobile towers operate with ‘non-ionising radiation’ they can not damage living tissue, penetrate your tin-foil hat or give you COVID (remember that one from not so long ago?). Similar arguments were of course made for the health of humans around WiFi, back in the day, (which operates in similar GHz bands,) and they continue to be totally evidence free after three decades of proliferation.

Scratch the surface of the story of the dead irradiated bees and it turns-out to originate from a piece of 2019 click-bait that showed photos of dead bees in front of hives in California (that were coincidentally near early 5g towers). As sensible voices pointed out at the time though, the apparent casualties were actually expelled Drones. An annual event.

Yes, something or possibly several somethings are definitely impacting on bee health and especially the Queen lifecycle, but this is more likely down to our changing weather and climate rather than a specific new technology.