Excessive Iced Tea Habit Blamed For Man's Kidney Failure

An Arkansas resident with an iced tea habit of a gallon per day will have to cut down on his favorite beverage, as doctors discovered that it was the cause of his kidney failure.

The 56-year-old man apparently drank approximately 16 8-ounce servings of iced tea every day, and by last May, he sought medical help for "nausea, weakness, fatigue and body aches," according to The Associated Press.

Doctors eventually determined the cause to be his excessive consumption of black tea, which contains a chemical called oxalate that is known to cause kidney stones and kidney failure in high amounts. Despite the fact that he does not have a family history of kidney disease, the man may need to remain on dialysis for the rest of his life.

"It was the only reasonable explanation," Dr. Umbar Ghaffar, a physician from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, told the AP. Given his consumption of 16 cups of black tea per day, the man was ingesting between three and 10 times the level of oxalate of the average American.