Thousands of kidney patients in Britain could struggle to afford life-saving dialysis treatment due to the energy crisis, an expert has warned. Fiona Loud, policy director for Kidney Care UK, says the increasing costs of electricity and fuel pose a serious threat.
Dialysis treatment sees patients connected to a machine which takes on the role of the kidneys, cleaning toxins from the blood and removing fluid which would otherwise build up inside the body. But the machines are expensive to power - and the costs are only set to increase.
Fiona estimates that up to 30,000 Brits could be affected, either by rising energy bills at home or the cost of getting to hospital for treatment. She said: “We’ve found people with kidney disease are often financially disadvantaged and people receiving dialysis at home are at particular risk due to the high energy consumption from dialysis machines.
