IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - July/August 2023 - 88

Special Section on Consumer Healthcare Technologies in Smart Cities
Country-Designed NIR Safety Standards
OET Bulletin 65 by the U.S.16 The Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) regulates
interstate and international communications,
including radio, television, wire, satellite, and
cable. The FCC designed exposure limits for electric
field strength and power density for the
transmitters working at frequencies from 300 kHz
to 100 GHz in OET Bulletin 65, which is still effective
nowadays, on August 1, 1996.
GB 8702-2014 by China17 Ministry of Ecology
and Environment of the People's Republic of
China (MEEPRC) issued the National Standard
GB 8702-2014, entitled " controlling limits for the
electromagnetic environment " in 2015.
SanPiN 2.1.8/2.2.4.1383-03 by Russia18
The Ministry of Health (Minzdrav) is the federal
executive authority in charge of creating and
enforcing government policy and legislative regulations
in the areas of healthcare, obligatory
health insurance, etc. which has approved the
SanPiN 2.1.8/2.2.4.1383-03 since 2013.
The Conformity Confirmation Guidelines
for Radio Protection by Japan19 The Ministry
of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC)
regulates communication-related services in
Japan. Radio Radiation Protection Guidelines for
Human Exposure to Electromagnetic Fields
(RRPG) to direct the nonionizing protection.
Safety Code 6 by Canada20 Health Canada
(HC) is a federal department that cares for Canadian
citizens' health. They have issued Safety
Code 6 to regulate human exposure to EMFs.
No: TEC/TP/EMF/001/04.JUN 2018 by
India21 The exposure limits for the radio frequency
field have been made by the Department
of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications,
i.e., the relative regulator in India, with the
standard No.: TEC/TP/EMF/001/04.JUN 2018.
COMPARISON OF THE SPECIFIC
VALUES OF NONIONIZING
STANDARDS
This section compares the radiation limits of
global standards. It will be seen that the difference
in ceiling value of radiation creates a conflict of
88
knowledge where one standard says " acceptable "
whereas the other standard says " excessive. " The
concept of NRSDex will be introduced in the
" Design of NRSDex " section to embrace the conflicts
and provide guidance for decisionmaking.
Specific Absorption Rate (SAR)
As shown in Table 1, it can be summarized
that two SAR levels are widely used: the 1.6 W/kg
(averaged over 1 g), and the 2 W/kg (averaged
over 10 g).
1) 1.6 W/kg, adopted by the U.S., Canada, Korea,
and India, respectively.
2) 2 W/kg, adopted by the other countries.
Power-Density (PD) Reference Levels.
The PD reference levels settled by the mentioned
standards are listed in Table 2. Among
the seven different standards, it is concluded
that Russia's standard is the most stringent/
restrictive one. Then, China and India follow.
The constraints designed by other standards are
relatively loose.
Discussions
The countries set varying restrictions for the
particular absorption rate and power density reference
level, as stated in the previous sections.
It creates uncertainty regarding the safety of
NIR. For example, a U.K.-approved device that
meets the 2W/kg SAR standard may fail the NIR
safety test in the United States. A product that
fulfills Japan's power density benchmark may
not fulfill India's requirements.
DESIGN OF NRSDex
Regarding the fact that there is presently no
universally agreed " safe level " in the world, i.e.,
countries continue to debate the true worth of
safety levels, it confuses manufacturers and consumers
in designing and selecting healthcare
devices. A global comprehensive quantitative
indicator that reflects the level of radiation exposure
can address this issue.
Internet of Things index (IDex) is a quantized
index to measure the maturity of IoT objects,
being developed by IEEE Standard Working
Group P2668.23 The IDex, which is the first of its
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