Patient preferences have a social welfare interpretation consonant with a belief that the society affected by present decisions will last for a very long time. In stochastic settings, these preferences lead to justifications for variants of the precautionary principle.

New fifth generation (5G) telecommunications systems, now being rolled out globally, have become the subject of a fierce controversy. Some health protection agencies and their scientific advisory committees concluded that there is no conclusive evidence harm. Several recent reviews by independent scientists, however, suggest significant uncertainty on this question, with rapidly emerging potent...