Author Daniel Ramirez from Honolulu, USA https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Path_between_sugar_canes_(5216462193).jpg
Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Does global warming cause kidney disease? According to a study published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases, the root cause of a mystery illness which has killed 10s of thousands of sugar cane workers in Central America might be chronic dehydration, as a result of frequent hard, manual labour in extreme heat.
According to the study;
… Despite limited resources, we documented widespread decreased kidney function in coastal communities related to years of work on coastal sugarcane/cotton plantations. The high prevalence of eGFR <60 mL/min/1.73 m2 in the coastal communities, 18% of men aged 20-60 years, indicates the severity of the epidemic in a region where there is little to offer to patients and where CKD often progresses to ESRD and death. It is noteworthy that decreased eGFR also is related to cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. The risk of premature death from cardiovascular disease at CKD stages 3-4 is higher than that for reaching ESRD.38, 39 This study from El Salvador, as well as the recent Nicaraguan studies,23, 24, 25 provides important clues for etiologic studies, particularly heat stress.
It is urgent to assess the causes of this severe public health problem with properly designed etiologic and clinical research. A thorough medical workup including kidney biopsies and histopathologic examinations from a small group of affected individuals in rather early stages of CKD is needed to confirm the interstitial nature of the disease and provide clues with regard to pathogenesis. Etiologic research would use random samples from a proper study base and repeated measurements of all pertinent exposures with emphasis on heat exposure, environmental and water pollutants (particularly pesticide residues and heavy metals), and amount of water intake during work and rest.
Precautionary preventive actions must be implemented already at this stage, providing sufficient water and rest for workers in hot environments. There is a threat that global warming will dramatically increase populations exposed to hard work in hot climates. If heat stress is a causal factor for CKD, this disease will be an added health risk related to climate change.
Read more: http://www.ajkd.org/article/S0272-6386(11)01785-9/fulltext
One of my first jobs was working in a poorly ventilated rubber and plastic moulding factory in Australia. During summertime, under the blazing Australian sun, the temperature outside frequently reached 104F (40c). Inside the factory the temperature often exceeded 120F (50c). Due to the poor ventilation, the air inside the factory was humid, and was thick with a haze of poisonous chemicals – sulphates, organo-chlorides, ketones, a thoroughly nasty cocktail of toxic substances. Undoubtably anyone working in that environment sustained at least some organ damage, including most likely to our kidneys – we all absolutely stank of chemicals when the end of shift bell rang.
Why didn’t we suffer high mortality rates, like the workers in this study?
For starters, we were properly hydrated – the one thing the company did right was to ensure we were receiving the correct amount of well balanced rehydration electrolytes, rather than whatever random concoction people working in third world cane fields receive. On the hottest days, someone would circulate with drinks every few minutes.
The other factor, is we were using machines. The work was boring, and physical, but it wasn’t hugely strenuous. Nothing like the level of physical exertion required to work cane fields, without the benefits of modern technology.
If physical work in extreme heat is causing the mystery kidney disease, the simplest solution is surely to help workers in poor countries buy modern equipment, such as a few fossil fuel powered tractors and harvesters, to reduce the need for extreme manual exertion in harsh conditions.
I’ll go one better. Weight Loss causes global warming. 🙂
During weight loss, nearly all of your weight is lost is due to exhalation of water and CO2.
Now, I originally wanted to link a video explaining the chemistry of the metabolic processes but I forgot where I saw it and after doing a search on “weight loss CO2 respiration” and seeing all those saggy bodies I just felt like I wanted to puke and I lost my sense of humor.
Since CO2 is plant food and not linked to global warming, weight loss does not cause Global Warming.
If anyone can find that video I would like to see it but I am not looking anymore. I saw it on wimp dot com. -gag-
Not sure if this is what you meant , but it’s an interesting video for people with curious minds !!!!
https://youtu.be/vuIlsN32WaE
Great video. He does misspeak a few times but it is very illustrative.
C55 H104 O6 +78 O2 —-> 55 CO2 + 52 H2O + Enthapy
84% of the mass loss is CO2
ie if everyone in the USA looses 50 lbs on average ( and I do think that is possible) about 7 million tons of CO2 will be released!!!!
OMG… Everybody….get fat, die and get buried to sequester all that CO2.
@Paul Westhaver
“OMG… Everybody….get fat, die and get buried to sequester all that CO2.”
I’m working on it. Somebody has to eat that last slice of pie… to save the planet, of course.
Fat is an excellent CO2 sink.
I’m really convinced that many of these researchers mention climate change in their studies simply to get more research funding. These people aren’t stupid. Even if the link to climate change is ridiculously thin, it opens up so many more avenues for grants and research dollars. It appears that weather plays a role in this disease, but it’s really about the working conditions. Anyone can clearly see that. But throw in the climate change reference and all of a sudden there’s more money available.
Southern Hemisphere atmospheric climate temperature anomaly: inconsequential..
End of story.
Drink more water, demand better work conditions. Suggest a mixture of cold water and a bit of Gatorade always be available at the work site. Kidney disease of this type is unknown in North America, Australia and Hawaii. Because worker health is important.
Don’t you see?
This is a double pronged attack on two evil entities. Sugar and CO2.
I moved to Florida in 1991 from New England. I am able to work outside at any time of the year for hours at a time. I take methotrexate for RA which is known to impair kidney function. I take blood tests every 90 days to check on my GFR which is always above 75. I drink lots of water and other fluids to keep hydrated and replace minerals. Blaming climate change is bullspit.
“Blaming climate change is bullspit.”
Right concept, Tom. Wrong end of the bull.
ROTFLMAO ….thanks
The sugar plantations will mechanize and/or start taking better care of their workers when they run out of slaves.
Wikipedia has a nice description of the Chronic Kidney Disease called Mesoamerican Nepropaathy which suggests there are still many possible causes including over-the-counter use/abuse of NSAIDs for pain relief. The pesticide hypothesis is confounded by CKD found in lower altitude workers and not in higher altitude workers within the same crops, like sugarcane. Environmental ground water contamination hypothesis is also confounded by the high prevalence of CKD in men vs women and not found in children.
“Mesoamerican Nephropathy (MeN) is a currently unexplained epidemic of chronic kidney disease of unknown origin (CKDu),[1] prevalent in the Pacific ocean coastal low lands of the mesoamerican region, including southern Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras and Costa Rica.”
The self-medication of NSAIDS hypothesis has a certain merit as the CKD diagnosis has been recognized as recent in origin and mostly in young and middle aged men. Dehydration and NSAIDS chronic use is a treatable/preventable causation as opposed to harebrained schemes as preventing global warming.
Funny the mention of NSAIDs as a culprit. It could be, but I doubt the workers in question have the money to buy anything at all at the “farmacia”. If they do have the money, other medications such as prednisone, codeine, Vicodin, OxyContin, etc., are basically available OTC for about the same price; yet there isn’t really any abuse problem.
Tom Crozier
“If they do have the money, other medications such as prednisone, codeine, Vicodin, OxyContin, etc., are basically available OTC for about the same price;”
Interesting assertion, do you have any data to support it?
I live there, and in California.
But other than that, no. I don’t have any evidence.
Tom Crozier
I did a Google search for Costa Rica:
Oxycontin 40 mg 10 tablets 32475.96 crc or $50 USD
Ibuprofen 800mg 90 tablets $8.60 USD at Walmart.
What may be available over the counter may not be what people can afford. Ibuprofen appears to be considerably cheaper than Oxycontin and for laborers, self-medication with cheaper product may be more prevalent.
Maybe. But if you can’t afford either there is little difference. You are welcome to come down and see for yourself what is available from local small businesseses. The people in question don’t go to Walmart; and even if they had internet access, they don’t know how to read.
Tom Crozier
I was in Costa Rica this last February on an eco tour for three weeks which included sugarcane fields, coffee plantations, and various fruit crops fields besides rainforests and dry arid Western areas choking with dust, burning sugarcane, and diesel transports (Pan American Highway). Our tour took us through some back country to get to these plantations. A lot of labor came from Nicaragua to work seasonally in the fields with the hand work. Besides beer and rum, there were the usual bottled Coke soft drinks stacked two meters high being sold wherever people congregated. Clean water was not a very common sight as most of the rivers and streams were contaminated with bacteria, viruses and parasites.
As for CKD, it was hard to tell who may have had it until of course they progressed to end stage renal disease: hollow faces, edematous legs and swollen belly, the usual stigmata of systemic disease and dysfunction.
Translation: We used the “magic word”. Now, give us a grant for us to continue our research.
alexwade: I, and many, many more, couldn’t agree more with you!
Access to cheap and abundant energy would also allow for air conditioned break and lunch facilities. In addition having air conditioned homes which are more prevalent when energy is abundant and cheap would also help. Everything is better for the people when energy is abundant and cheap..Progressives and the warmists are all about expensive and unreliable energy, which will increase mortality and lower standard of livings contrary to their claims that it will promote prosperity and health.
For sure, the warmist claim about green energy helping the third world is a bit like the dodgy claim that subsidising green energy stimulates first world economies…
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/10/15/claim-americans-will-have-to-settle-for-less-to-defeat-climate-change/
1) Central America has been hot for millenia.
2) Even the models predict that there will be very little warming caused by CO2 in the tropics because of the already existing prevalence of water.
There is a threat that global warming will dramatically increase populations exposed to hard work in hot climates.
….Let’s see…first it was a slight increase in CO2 would cause run away global humidity
…then it was…no change in the tropics…..temp increase at the higher latitudes
….now, we’re all going to die and damn the humidity
RiHo08
October 18, 2015 at 11:53 am
Comments are very apt. Queensland cane manual cutters ended up with back problems and ended up leaving the industry in the 60’s.
NSAIDs used to treat back pain together with dehydration and hence a reduction of renal blood flow lead to kidney damage.
Additional pain from kidney damage effects such as headaches lead to further NSAID intake when self medicating, compounding the disease.
In dogs toxic ingestion from Blue Green algae and heavy metals in ground water and dams, together with degradation products of Doxycycline in dried pigs ears all lead to kidney damage and often secondary ascending kidney infections.
The whole study seems like misinformation. They should have studied the use of Roundup/ glyphosate in the same area and measured the glyphosate content in the kidneys and gut bacteria of these prematurely killed men. Climate change is not a threat to human race and life on earth but glyphosate use certainly is.
That’s very interesting. I have been very wary of using Roundup to ‘tidy’ up weeds since a friend of ours became very ill after working where it had been sprayed. He was ill for a long time and was very sure the Roundup was the cause of his illness. He sort of recovered but then became ill with cancer and died fairly recently.
Roundup is nasty IMO – but very effective. I use roundup to clear the tropical weeds in my garden, which somehow manage to thrive and grow with disappointing vigour, despite the impact of global warming. Always feel like rubbish afterwards, for the rest of the day. I wouldn’t want to spray roundup as a career, or at the very least you’d have to wear full protective kit.
Still, when you consider what Roundup replaced – the old way was copper sulphate mixed with salt – roundup is the lesser of the available evils.
[Snip. Sockpuppetry. ~mod.]
I was going to use Roundup earlier this year to clear a large area of thick brambles.
But, noticing that they were quite dry, I instead returned with an electric paint sprayer, a barrel of diesel and a cigarette lighter.
The home-made flamethrower effect looks quite alarming, but, after an hour of work, all the brambles were completely incinerated, and I was able to mow over the area.
I must state that I did not have environment agency approval for this method of clearing brambles.
But, providing that you don’t set fire to yourself, it works brilliantly.
(P.S. I have no links to the oil industry. This is not a promotional message!!)
It’s not just Roundup and it’s not just kidney failure. Roundup, if it’s bad at all, isn’t nearly as bad as other products past and present. [Full disclosure – I’m a Monsato shareholder]
http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:558620/FULLTEXT01.pdf
I still choose to use Roundup Tom – much preferable to pulling up prolific tropical weeds by hand.
I’ve used products with glyphosate and others with 2,4-D. Many years ago I wanted to get rid of Bindweed under grape vines. More recently the problem (different location) was knapweed. I’ve also pulled and cut weeds out. With acres to do, chemicals are a big help. As the number of weeds gets low a hand sprayer is useful.
People need to study the weed and know what to spray, and when (important).
My first use of Roundup was about 1978. I’ve never noticed a medical issue.
I know there are other issues with chemicals and modified seeds – that is not indicated in the above, but I am aware of these things.
My perception of not feeling great afterwards could be psychosomatic, or maybe I’ve got an unusual reaction to glyphosphate. Or maybe its my habit of ignoring the instructions and mixing 3-4x over strength solutions to make sure the weeds actually die…
I found using roundup would clear the whole patch sprayed and more, even if you used extreme care not to spray too liberally. In the end, I just used to dig the weeds up carefully. Ended up with a better lawn (Approx 1800 square meters of it) for it!
Does it work on kudzu? Asking for a friend.
These days, Global Warming accounts for all actions and phenomena, including the results of horse races, which can be predicted with certainty by Global Warming Theory.
Or, at least, using the theory it is possible to explain the discrepancy between the predicted outcome of the horse-race and what actually was documented as the official outcome.
It might be imagined that in a race with ten horses, ten predictions could cover all possible winners, and hence a group of people making ten predictions would always get one winner,
The AGW prediction crew, do not seem to have this kind of luck. They make 73 predictions.
And all 73 predictions are wrong.
Maybe they should learn, and spread their predictions out a bit!!! 🙂
One’s things for sure, whatever solution they propose to fix this problem by reducing global warming will not only make the problem worse, but will result in a lot more sickness and death overall.
Correction: One thing’s for sure… (Please ignore my dyslexia.)
“Does global warming cause kidney disease?”
Of course it does. The big question is “What doesn’t it cause?”
“What doesn’t it cause?”
With all it’s magical powers, global warming can cause extreme heat, extreme cold, extreme precipitation, extreme drought, and can even raise your taxes. But what it never does is lower them.
Same with my electricity bills. (I don’t know how much of that is due to Global Warming, and how much to privatisation.)
Has other interesting affects, too. One is that causes the words “effect” and “affect” to be replaced by “impact”.
Another is prostitution.
http://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/4906/20150327/global-warming-may-cause-women-to-become-prostitutes-says-rep-barbara-lee.htm
A bit of clipping and pasting
October 2012: Dr. Orantes, a local nephrologist, says: “There are three factors: prohibited pesticides, combinations of pesticides, and no protection from pesticides.”
Richard J Johnson of the University of Colorado says: „ … this (fructose-making and later kidney-damaging) process gets turned on when you get dehydrated .“
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/oct/14/kidney-disease-killing-sugar-cane-workers-central-america
… chief among suspects are the highly toxic agrochemicals sprayed and dusted on fields throughout Central America, which is the largest consumer of pesticides per capita in Latin America, according to MEDICC Review.
The cane cutters could also be aggravating damage by slaking their thirst with high-fructose sodas that can harm kidneys, researchers said.
Other specialists, meanwhile, said irreversible damage may be caused by leptospirosis or a hantavirus, killer pathogens spread by the urine and droppings of infected rats and mice that infest hundreds of square miles of cane fields, gorging on cuttings.
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/6/22/central-americankidneydisease.html
CKD was first documented in Costa Rica in the 1970s, and has since been detected throughout Central America.
In Nicaragua, they don’t come bigger than the Pellas Group, the conglomerate which owns ISA. Pellas companies also make the prizewinning dark rum Flor de Caña, and produce ethanol, a lucrative sugar cane byproduct used to make biofuels. The group’s CEO, Carlos Pellas – nicknamed the sugar king – is close to Ortega, and was recently .
ISA says its field hands work on average six hours a day and rest for 20 minutes every hour under shade to minimise the risk of heat stress. Supervisors ensure everyone drinks 1.6 litres of water every hour …
Workers … say that during the harvest, cane cutters work for eight to 14 hours daily in temperatures often reaching 38C. They usually work a six or seven day week .
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/16/-sp-nicaragua-kidney-disease-killing-sugar-cane-workers
Chronic kidney disease of unknown origin (CKDu) was first observed in 1994 in Sri Lankan rice paddy farming communities. Since then the disease has proliferated and affected 11 other countries on three continents, amongst them Central American sugar producing countries like El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Honduras.
Although CKDu was first acknowledged as a problem in Central America in 2000, it has existed in the region since the 1970s. According to Will Storr, reporting on the CKDu epidemic from El Savlador for the Guardian, the disease remained relatively unnoticed until recently because “there are no kidney specialists [in the deep countryside] to identideclared the country’s first billionairefy such an unusual condition.
CKD is caused by excessive sugar consumption, while CKDu seems to be associated with the boom in sugar milling spurred by increased consumption and demand. Poor practices in sugar milling countries like El Salvador and Nicaragua expose harvesters to toxic pesticides and harrowing working conditions that appear to be associated with CKDu. http://www.brownpoliticalreview.org/2014/06/sickly-sweet-the-link-between-the-sugar-cane-industry-and-chronic-kidney-disease-of-unknown-origin/
Glyphosate, Hard Water and Nephrotoxic Metals: Are They the Culprits Behind the Epidemic of Chronic Kidney Disease of Unknown Etiology in Sri Lanka?
http://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/11/2/2125/pdf
As a slight curiosity, I have just discovered that the very popular and much cited independent newspaper article, “Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past”, has been pulled from their website.
And opening a link to it produced this result:
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html
Earlier this year it was still available to view, as demonstrated by the wonderful wayback machine:
http://web.archive.org/web/20150114205355/http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html
IS IT NORMAL FOR THE INDEPENDENT TO PULL ARTICLES IN THIS MANNER?
Certainly I have found a few other articles from the year 2000, which continue to exist.
Is this a case of – the commissar vanishes?
At this rate, children will not know what articles predicting the end of snow, are.
As they used to say in the Soviet Union, the future is certain, its only the past which changes… 🙂
When you find paper copies in far flung areas with a sharp razor cut hole where the article should be then you will know.
Until then you can expect links to go cold.
Then there is this (likely unrelated to snow):
“ Europe’s highest court said on Tuesday that people had the right to influence what the world could learn about them through online searches, a ruling that rejected long-established notions about the free flow of information on the Internet.” [NYT, David Streitfeld, May 13, 2014]
Ahhh, the revisionists are at it again.
I guess the CAGW weenies got tired of having that one thrown in their face.
Watch out, there will be more crocs around very soon:
http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/150924/ncomms9438/abs/ncomms9438.html
Dear Sir /Madam,
Hello ,Do you want to buy or sell your kidney for money, Appolo hospital is urgently in need for O+ve and A+ve kidney donors with any passports require. If any one is willing to donate or buy please contact us through my email id_ hospltalltd@gmail.com
Dr.ROBORT
Phone Number: +919686254983
Very worried about a few issues here.
Mad dogs and Central Americans go out in the noonday sun. Why are they growing sugarcane at all? It is a source of added poison to our Western processed food. The only thing sugarcane is good for is making rum and other forms of medicinal drinks. Do only the cane cutters suffer dehydration? Do labour laws prevent a nightshift in the field?
Possible solution: get rid of the sugar cane and plant rice, cucumbers, ground nuts, corn, and feed a few of the local villages. Just like they do in SE Asia.
Not climate science I know, but not rocket science either.
Not everyone holds the irrational belief that sugar is “poison”. You could ask if it’s a necessary part of diet. That would be no. Neither is coffee, tea, corn, rice, cucumbers or any other single food. Why not just pick say a dozen foods that the most recent, but not replicated, studies show are “good” for you and grow those to the exclusion of others? While we’re at it, meat can go too. After that, find a way to dehydrate and store all of there without refrigeration (Saves billions of gallons of fossil fuel that way—transportation costs are nil on dried foods and cutting out refrigeration saves billions on producing electricity. Then the utopian dream of wind turbines might work. No need for stoves either. Huge savings all around.) Why make eating in any way enjoyable and filled with hundreds of options? Food tablets for all, I always say (or not).
I read this post after reading the one about wind turbines. And I have just one thought: I would say humans are the most fortunate that we can influence our faith, but the animals have to adapt or they will have no other way. At least, we can try and do something, even in this situation….
According to the MSU satellite temperature data published by NOAA, temperatures in the TROPICS have not increased for the last 35 years.
Last I checked, Central America was located directly in the tropics… around 10 degrees north, in fact.
So what warming, exactly, are these scientists talking about?
see: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/temp-and-precip/msu/time-series/tropics/lt/jan/1mo
To end the vicious slavery in the Socialist Utopia of Nicaragua no cane or cotton should be planted. The U. S. taxpayer should provide enough Dollars for the unemployed workers and their Communist Masters..er.. representatives. Cuba should be compensated for their military efforts to kill..er..reeducate the Neanderthal Capitalists, the Caribean Blacks and Indians and Ameriphiles in establishing the Socialist Utopia.
Or the unemployment could be ignored and machines brought in.
Herbicides could be eliminated and weeding done by hand and pesticides avoided by crushing insects to put in a water and ethanol solution and spayed on plants. U. S. taxpayers would, of course, replace the lost crop values.
Or the problems could be addressed by permitting unbridled competition. That seems to have worked in the U. S. and Singapore. Not many native stoop-laborers in those two places. Not much kidney disease either. At least not in 30 year olds.
Taxpayers sure made the warmists rich in the G-7 countries.