Dear Editor,

On Thursday, March 12 the global community observed World Kidney Day, a moment intended to highlight one of the most rapidly expanding health crises of our time — chronic kidney disease.

Worldwide, more than 850 million people are estimated to be living with some form of kidney disease. It is a silent epidemic that often progresses quietly until patients reach kidney failure, when survival may depend on dialysis or transplantation. Despite its enormous human and economic cost, kidney disease has never received the level of global attention devoted to other major illnesses.

For Jamaica, the implications are particularly troubling. Physicians and nephrologists have long warned that the number of Jamaicans developing chronic kidney disease continues to rise, driven largely by hypertension, diabetes, and lifestyle-related illnesses. When kidney failure advances to its final stages, many patients require dialysis several times per week simply to remain alive. While dialysis sustains life, it is not a cure. It is physically demanding, costly, and emotionally draining for both patients and their families.

The world must begin thinking beyond managing kidney failure and instead focus on solving it. In recent years, global leaders have demonstrated that bold ambition can accelerate medical progress. Under the leadership of US President Joe Biden, the Cancer Moonshot initiative mobilised billions of dollars towards research aimed at dramatically reducing cancer deaths. Kidney disease deserves a similar level of urgency. What is needed is a coordinated global effort — a Kidney Moonshot — to drive breakthroughs in prevention, early detection, and treatment.

Such an initiative would accelerate research into promising technologies, including artificial kidneys, wearable dialysis devices, regenerative medicine, and even bioengineered organs — innovations that could one day free patients from lifelong dependence on dialysis. At the same time, governments must expand screening programmes for hypertension and diabetes, the two conditions responsible for the majority of kidney disease cases, because prevention and early detection remain the most powerful weapons against kidney failure.

In this regard, the Government’s recently announced initiative to apply a Special Consumption Tax on sugary drinks deserves commendation, as policies that discourage excessive sugar consumption can help reduce the prevalence of diabetes and other metabolic disorders that place enormous strain on the kidneys and the public health system.

Jamaica itself could also play an important role in addressing this crisis. With the right policy framework and investment, the island could establish a National Nephrology Centre of Excellence — a modern facility combining clinical care, research, training, and medical tourism. Such a centre could treat local patients while also attracting international visitors seeking reliable and affordable dialysis care, strengthening both health-care capacity and the wider economy.

Kidney disease does not discriminate. Public figures such as Stevie Wonder, Natalie Cole, Tracy Morgan, and basketball champion Alonzo Mourning have all battled kidney failure and undergone transplants. Their stories remind us that this disease can affect anyone — regardless of one’s station in life.

World Kidney Day should, therefore, be more than a day of awareness. It should serve as a call to action for governments, researchers, and global health institutions to pursue bold solutions. A Kidney Moonshot would bring kidney disease out of the shadows and place it squarely on the global health agenda where it belongs.

Let us also pause to thank the doctors, nephrologists, dialysis technicians, and the devoted family members and friends — the entire team — who stand beside patients through this long struggle. And to those living with kidney disease: Hold on to hope, for the world must not stop searching for answers.

Douglas Martin Levermore

dmlevermore@gmail.com