[0b0001]

If you're talking to a person 1m away from you, both of you can whisper. If you're 50m away, both of you need to shout.

It's similar to radio transmission.

The closer some base station antenna is, the lower the power your smartphone needs to reach the base station. Having many base stations reduces the effective field power.

Modern LTE and 5G also has something that is called beamforming. Instead of shouting in all directions, the base station restricts the radio signal to the direction of the smartphone. Other won't hear the noise.

It's not correct that "faster data" means there's more "EM things" around us. Basically we use the radio transmission more efficiently.

tldr: if you wanna avoid radiation, be close to a base station where powersaving kicks in.

[jvanderbot]

The base station transmits with higher power and much more frequently than your cell phone does (unless you are the only one served by the tower and tx more than rx for some reason). If you are concerned about radiation from telcom / cell, living near a base station is a bad idea.