Do fluorescent lights cause cataracts?
Dear Cecil:A friend of mine, who is paranoid about everything, recently told me that fluorescent lights cause cataracts. Everything I’ve read about these lights before talks about them glowingly–they’re so energy efficient I should replace every lamp in my home with fluorescent bulbs. And of course I and millions of other people toil under them for most of our waking hours every day. Are we all going to go blind? Why have I not heard about these harmful effects before? Is my paranoid friend nuts too, or is there some conspiracy to keep this information out of the press and away from the general public? — Mary M.Q.C., Chicago Dear Mary: If there is, my payoff from the Bulb Trust must have gotten lost in the mail. The reason you haven’t heard much about the dangers of fluorescent lighting is that there isn’t much to hear. No study has ever established a link between fluorescent lights and cataracts, and there haven’t been many studies period. While fears about the bulbs aren’t entirely
