Answer to Question #19682 in Electricity and Magnetism for ash

Question

explain why is it dangerous and even fatal for an electronic pacemaker to near sources of electromagnetic waves?

Answer 1

We are 'bathed' in electromagnetic waves all of the time. Cell phone transmissions, computers, power lines, microwaves ovens: all emit significant electromagnetic waves: some with quite tangible amounts of energy.

But while it is true that there is a theoretical danger to pacemakers, people with pacemakers live relatively normal lives: they use phones and microwave ovens, they walk under power lines, and so forth without danger.

The actual pulses that pacemakers emit are conducted by the tissues in the body. That would take a great deal of power to influence - just as it takes a great deal of power to disrupt the normal signals to the heart by electromagnetic radiation (emr). Of course, even without a pacemaker, very strong emr can be damaging to humans or animals.

The electronics within a pacemaker that are used to generate these pulses are more liable to interference, but there are ways to shield such devices against electromagnetic fields (called Gaussian Shielding), and that sort of shielding makes it rather difficult to interfere with such circuitry. In the end, these devices are very stable and very immune to being interfered with.

There are special situations: like near Magnetic Imaging devices which generate very VERY powerful magnetic fields - where a pacemaker IS vulnerable. But these situations are rare. One does not often hear of 'incidental' disruptions of pacemakers.