RISKY BUSINESS

By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

According to the CDC’s National Health Interview Survey, only about 29% of US adults lived in a house with a landline phone as of 2022.  That is a reduction of 90% since 2004!  Before I launch into my interest in this trend, you might be wondering, as I did, why the same people who are monitoring Covid and the flu are also in charge of determining phone usage.  Well, apparently around twenty years ago the CDC began to worry about a “new” technology – the cell phone. Because the CDC conducts some of the nation’s most extensive phone surveys — used to produce vital information about rates of immunization, risky behavior, health care use and chronic conditions — they worried that changes in telephone access could distort their results. So, they began to survey both landline and cell phone households. Rather unexpectedly, they discovered a connection between the type of phone used and overall well-being and what they found was surprising: people who have cut the cord, eliminating a landline to rely only on wireless, are generally more likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as binge drinking, smoking, and eschewing health insurance. When I first read that sentence, I immediately thought of purple-haired, nose-ring-wearing millennials, but it turns out that the researchers controlled for age, sex, race, ethnicity and income and found it to be true across almost all demographics. Unsurprisingly, the only demographic for which households with landlines still outnumber wireless-only households is the 65 and older crowd.  In other words, me.  And yet…last month even I was driven to finally cut the cord.

Over the past several weeks it’s become abundantly apparent that it’s not good to live in a “swing” state in an election year.  And I’m not referring to the type of swing alluded to in the aforementioned “risky behavior” concern of the CDC. Arizona is one of the 6-7 states considered up for grabs, so we are inundated with ads on tv and we receive incessant phone calls from everyone running for office, from presidential contenders down to the local dog catcher.  I’ve registered with the National Do Not Call registry and with the Cox Nomorobo system, but to no avail.  The factories that pay people to annoy you with phone calls are always one step ahead.  I’d been thinking about abandoning my landline for almost a year, but I was reluctant to do so.  It’s been my home phone number for 26 years and every now and again an old friend will call on that line. Plus, I think when you live alone it’s good to have two numbers so in the (likely) event you forget where you left your phone, you can call yourself.  I read that it is good to have a landline in case of a power outage, but I recalled that years ago Cox changed my landline to VOIP, connected to my internet modem, so it would be useless when the power goes out.  The final straw in my decision-making occurred one night two weeks ago when I got a spam call at 1:20 a.m. I decided enough was enough.  In an “aha” moment in the shower that day I realized I could port the number over to a cell phone and use the settings to mute all of the calls.

            My old phones

I reluctantly went down to the Cox store with my idea.  Reluctant because dealing with any utility company is usually fraught with frustration and complicated service plans.  But my fears were unfounded.  A very nice young man took me under his wing.  I told him I wasn’t looking for the latest or greatest phone; I didn’t even need it to be smart.  What I needed was a dumb phone that was just…a phone.  He directed me to the most basic smart Android phone with just 1 GB of data allowed per month, suggesting that in an emergency I could still use it to text or look up the local office of FEMA.  Of course, it doesn’t have the bells and whistles of my iPhone, but I just need it to sit on my office desk and block political ads. Armed with my new device, I came home and pulled out all seven of my landline phones. Suddenly I felt 20 years younger.

So far, my little phone is doing a great job.  It’s blocking calls like crazy and I’m sleeping better.  Plus, I’m even saving $26 a month. If I use the CDC as an indicator, now that I’m without a landline I can use my monthly savings to binge drink, smoke, cancel my Medicare supplemental plan and engage in risky behavior.  I think I’m going to like not having a landline.