Does Global Warming Cause Kidney Stones?

Recently researchers from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas released a study concluding increases in global temperature have direct effects on the numbers of kidney stone cases.  Kidney stones are a result of certain types of salts precipitating out in the kidneys.  The study suggests higher temperatures mean higher cases of dehydration, which can cause salts in the body to precipitate and cause kidney stones. 

Sounds like a logical conclusion…but not so fast.  We here at Wiggy’s Words of Wisdom pride ourselves on exploring all explanations and questioning the conventional, especially if the answer seems just too easy or politically correct.

Within the United States, about 10 to 15 percent of adults are diagnosed with kidney stones.  Southern states normally have a higher incident rate of kidney stones, 50 percent more than do Northeastern states.  The incidence rate among adults increases to 20 to 25 percent overall in the Middle East, supposedly because of the increased risk of dehydration.  The hotter it is, the higher the chance of dehydration, and the greater potential for developing kidney stones, right?  At least that’s what global warming advocates want you to think.

What global warming alarmists don’t want you to know is the typical Arabian diet is 50 percent lower in calcium and 250 percent higher in oxalates when compared to a typical Western diet.  Why is this significant you ask?

The most common type of kidney stone is composed of calcium oxalate crystals, occurring in about 80 percent of all kidney stone cases.  Common sense has long held the consumption of too much calcium could promote the development of calcium kidney stones.  However, current evidence suggests the consumption of low-calcium diets is actually associated with a higher overall risk for the development of kidney stones.  This is related to the role of calcium in binding ingested oxalate in the digestive tract. 

Oxalic acid is a strong organic acid that’s abundantly present in many plants.  Oxalic acid has the ability to form a strong bond with various minerals, such as sodium, potassium, magnesium, and calcium. When this occurs, the compounds formed are usually referred to as oxalate salts. Thus, “oxalate” usually refers to a salt of oxalic acid, one of which is calcium oxalate.

Although both sodium and potassium oxalate salts are water soluble, calcium oxalate is practically insoluble, which is why calcium oxalate, when present in high enough levels, has the propensity to precipitate in the kidneys or in the urinary tract to form calcium oxalate crystals or kidney stones.

Foods which are particularly high in oxalates include beets and beet greens, poke greens, okra, kale, sweet potatoes, turnip greens, raw peanuts, pecans, grits…do you see where I’m going here?  When is the last time you saw someone above the Mason Dixon Line eating okra or turnip greens?  It’s not the heat, it’s the diet!

“Not so fast …what about the Middle Eastern diet?  Most Arabs don’t eat sweet potatoes, turnip greens or beets and they’re almost twice as likely to develop kidney stones,” you say. 

As witnessed first hand during my trips to the Middle East, Arabs drink copious amounts of coffee and chai or spiced tea.  The coffee bean is considered a moderate level source of oxalates, while the leaves of the tea plant contain among the greatest measured concentrations of oxalic acid relative to other plants in the world!

And before any of you vegans start spouting off quoting controversial research which has linked high amounts of oxalate in the urine to eating meat and about the benefits of the “vegan lifestyle”…just so you know, tofu is also a very high source of oxalates.

So next time you read or hear about another study about global warming, blaming it for all of humanity’s problems, step back and think for a second…could this really be caused by greenhouse gases, or does it more likely have something to do with a global conspiracy?  Did I forget to mention beer is also a major source of dietary oxalates?  Good thing I’m a whiskey drinker.

Marc “Wiggy” Kovacs- Omniscient Observer of Obscure Oxalate Omissions