Mystery kidney disease killing Sri Lankan farmers

(MENAFN- Arab News) KONKETIYAWA: Karunawathie isn't hungry for breakfast. She rarely is these days but she forces herself to choke down a few bites of rice dried fish and a simple coconut mix. The doctors say it's better to have something in her stomach before the four-hour dialysis treatments.She's going for her second session of the week dressed all in pink right down to her flip-flops. Her fingers and toes are fat with fluid and her spongy arms feel like soft water balloons. Since she can no longer pass liquids on her own doctors have told her to drink only 500 milliliters a day equal to less than a can and a half of soda.As she walks unsteadily to the door her two youngest children 16 and 11 kneel before her and place their heads at her feet in a traditional show of respect.V.G. Karunawathie is only 40 years old but she is dying and no one knows why. Her kidneys have stopped working and now she's kept alive by a pump that filters waste from her blood twice a week through a snorkel-like tube implanted into her neck. The cause of her disease which affects an estimated 70000 to 400000 people in Sri Lanka's rice basket has baffled doctors and researchers for two decades. Even the World Health Organization hasn't been able to pinpoint what's killing as many as 10 people a month in Karunawathie's village ravaging one house while sparing the next as it creeps farther and farther into neighboring areas.The disease mirrors equally confounding conditions plaguing thousands of farmworkers in parts of India Egypt and Central America. Suspected causes include chronic dehydration and the heavy use and misuse of agrochemicals. In Sri Lanka fertilizer use is among the heaviest in the world.No one cause has been identified but theories abound. Many believe a combination of factors could be at play from toxic algae and hard ground water to heavy metal exposure and high fluoride in drinking water.But to Karunawathie there is no mystery at all. She understands more about this so-called chronic kidney disease of unknown etiology than anyone should. It killed her father mother and five brothers. Three other siblings have been sickened.As the youngest of a dozen children Karunawathie was diagnosed with the disease 12 years ago in her impoverished farming village.