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MY PAPER WEDNESDAY JULY 16, 2008

MORE people are likely to suffer from kidney stones as a result of global warming, said researchers at the University of Texas.

Kidney stones, formed from dissolved minerals in urine, can be extremely painful. They are often caused by dehydration.

If global warming trends continue – as projected by the United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last year – countries can expect as much as a 30 per cent rise in this disease in some of their driest areas, said findings published in the Monday’s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The increased incidence of disease would represent between 1.6 million and 2.2 million cases in the US by 2050, costing the US economy as much as US$1 billion (S$1.3 billion) in treatment costs.

“This study is one of the first examples of global warming’s direct medical effect on humans,” said Margaret Pearle, professor of urology at University of Texas Southwestern and the paper’s senior author.

“When people relocate from areas of moderate temperatures to warmer climates, a rapid increase in stone risk has been observed. This has been shown in military deployments to the Middle East, for instance.”

The lead author of the research, Mr Tom Brikowski, compared kidney-stone rates with UN temperature-increase forecasts, and created two mathematical models to predict its impact.

One showed an increase in the southern half of the US, including the existing “kidney-stone belt” of the south-eastern states.

“Similar climate-related changes in the prevalence of kidney-stone disease can be expected in other stone belts worldwide,” the study said.

– AFP

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