The Policy Update “Achieving Kidney Health in a Warming World” by Zachary Kribs published in May 2023 Kidney News includes the statement, “Perhaps the greatest opportunity to improve the environmental impact of existing therapies for people with kidney failure is to reduce the water usage in dialysis. Globally, dialysis requires enough medically pure water to fill Lake Tahoe annually.”
This estimate of the global water usage in dialysis is no longer believed to be accurate. A more accurate statement is that, globally, 265 billion liters of medically pure water is estimated to be used in dialysis every year, enough to fulfill the United Nations-recognized water needs of between 7 and 15 million people (1, 2).
References
- 1.↑
Ben Hmida M, et al. Water implications in dialysis therapy, threats and opportunities to reduce water consumption: A call for the planet. Kidney Int 2023; 104:46–52. doi: 10.1016/j.kint.2023.04.008
