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Ignoring it does not seem to make the problem go away, but debunking it is hard work. For articles as stupid as this one the debunking really must be done.
According to British doctors people who use mobile phones outdoors during a thunderstorm, put themselves at risk of being struck by lightning.
This suggests that if you are outdoors during a thunderstorm, then using a mobile phone will increase your chance of being hit by lightning. The fact is that being outdoors at all during a thunderstorm puts you at risk, using a mobile phone adds nothing to the risk of being struck. The very first sentence of the article is seriously misleading and is actually contradicted by the rest of the article.
It turns out that the only change in risk, is the additional risk of injury for those who do get hit by lightning.
It is not exactly a newsflash that being hit by lightning is bad for you.
In general, the best way to reduce your risk is not to be out in a thunderstorm. Stay indoors. This means check the sky yourself and check the weather report (any radio provides weather reports, also available on the Internet). A very minimal amount of planning will be vastly better protection than worrying about using your mobile phone. People tend to hear a storm in the distance and figure that they have plenty of time to get inside... then end up getting caught by surprise. Worrying about your phone is not going to save you, moving your feet is a better idea.
If you do get caught out, your next best strategy is get away from hilltops or high ground and to curl up in a ball and stay low to the ground until the storm passes over. Don't sit under a tree because the risk of a branch falling on your head is much larger than the risk of getting zapped. Sitting inside a car (not a convertible!) is helpful because the car itself provides some conductive shielding, ideally you would want to be in the very middle of the car and still curled up into a ball and don't touch the metal of the vehicle chassis.
According to the doctors from Northwick Park Hospital in northwest London, when someone is struck by lightning the high resistance of human skin results in lightning being conducted over the skin without entering the body; this is known as flashover.Conductive materials in direct contact with skin such as liquids or metallic objects disrupt the flashover and result is internal injury with the possibility of serious consequences.
The key phrase here being, "Conductive materials in direct contact with skin" which means that it doesn't matter whether you are using the mobile phone or just holding it or have it in your pocket. For that matter, metal frames on spectacles or a watch or jewelery or coins in your pocket, a belt buckle or even an underwire bra are all just as likely to disrupt the flashover and provide a path for the electricity to enter your body. Humans carry so many conductive and metalic items on an everyday basis that the mobile phone would be a microscopic additional risk factor.
Trying to depend on skin flashover to save you from a lightning strike is a last-resort strategy, which offers far less protection than avoiding getting hit in the first place. It's like jumping out of a plane and hoping to land on a haystack, then decrying the modern farmers who keep putting their hay into sheds.
So why bother with the nutty warning?
Because we all know deep down that mobile phones are dangerous, they are new-fangled gadgetry that are much more popular than they should be (especially with young people). Nothing makes a news story better than confirming irrational superstitions with some pseudo-science. Also, there is an old warning about using wired phones during a thunderstorm because the shock can travel down the cable. There are surge protectors that can stop this from happening but most people don't use them.
Here's some links to more useful things to do in a thunderstorm:
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