It is a mental model that assumes that CF is something in the lungs. This is not true. It is throughout the body, but especially impacts epidermal tissue, which includes both lung tissue and skin. Surfers are not just inhaling salty sea air. They are immersed in salt water and absorbing it through their skin. Plus people with CF are medically prescribed a high salt diet, so your assertion isn't really accurate. Consuming enough salt is a known treatment modality for CF. The only real difference here is that I felt the quality of salt mattered greatly. Furthermore, mucus is mostly salt and water, which is why you need to consume more of both when taking things like mucinex.

It’s not a mental model that CF is something in the lungs; it’s a treatment aimed at the pulmonary manifestations of the disease. No one is positing that saline inhalations are going to preserve pancreatic function, but that’s not because they forgot about the pancreas.

People with CF get a high salt diet because the same transporter defect causes an inability to reclaim sodium from sweat. This results in an inability to regulate water content, causing a hypovolemia. It’s not a “treatment modality” in that it directly treats the CF. It mitigates one consequence of CF: losing excess salt in sweat. That has nothing to do with dietary salt intake affecting the course of the disease generally.

And I don’t know where you got the information that surfers are absorbing salt through their skin. As far as I know (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0167273892..., https://ac.els-cdn.com/S0022202X15470599/1-s2.0-S0022202X154..., http://www.comprehensivephysiology.com/WileyCDA/CompPhysArti...) that’s not a thing, but if you have any sources to the contrary I’d be interested in reading them.

What can be absorbed through the skin depends on various factors: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absorption_(skin)

People with CF are prone to aquagenic wrinkling. In layman's terms, they get extremely pruney when they bath. This suggests they absorb the water at a higher rate than is normal due to their genetic disorder impacting epidermal function.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamadermatology/fullarticle...

No one is positing that saline inhalations are going to preserve pancreatic function, but that’s not because they forgot about the pancreas.

What I recall reading is that when people with CF surfed, their general prognosis was overall better. So if no one is positing that it has any impact on pancreatic function, then it seems to me they are viewing the data in highly selective terms and assuming it only impacts lung function and nothing else when the data does not suggest that.

Granted, I haven't dug deeply into the original data because it wasn't important to me. I was only trying to understand the positive results I was getting for my own edification. My recollection is the study was done in Australia if you want to try to find it.

I will add that it isn't actually necessary to prove people with CF absorb it through the skin. The article we are discussing states that surfers swallow a great deal more sea water than swimmers, 10x iirc. So surfers are, in fact, consuming sea salt.

> What I recall reading is that when people with CF surfed, their general prognosis was overall better.

Why would you think of sea salt as the relevant factor instead of the very well known positive effects on breathing and lung capacity caused by swimming?

Firsthand personal experience. I was consuming sea salt to great benefit and looking for studies that might cast light on the relationship between sea salt and cystic fibrosis.

Exercise also has played a significant role in my improvement. I am not discounting the impact it has. I just am baffled that they found that surfing benefits people with CF and their primary takeaway is that it must be beneficial to breath damp, salty air. There is a lot more going on when you surf than breathing damp, salty air. But that's the piece they turned into a medically prescribed treatment.

Exercise in conditions that involved inhalation of hypertonic saline during a period of increased tidal respiration, in a setting that reduces the amount of sweating typically experienced during exercise.

It’s not baffling.

>Quality of salt

It's not on its face impossible for sea and rock salt to differ in trace minerals, but be aware that the salt itself is the same in both. From the medical stuff you mentioned it sounds like it's the salt itself that's having the beneficial effect and not the other minerals.

Although, I do see an oft-overlooked wrinkle to it: the costs of these minor changes are so small that the odds that there might be something going on unknown to medicine might be worth taking.

I think the other trace minerals matter. But I also think simply consuming kosher or canning and pickling salt is better than consuming standard table salt.

Standard table salt typically has iodine added. It also has a chemical added to make it pour easier. This may not have a notable impact on a healthy person, but if you genetically misprocess various things and are medically prescribed a high amount of salt, that double whammy seems significant to me. You are consuming a lot of these extra chemicals and no one is questioning what that does to an already wonky physiology.

I no longer purchase Celtic Sea Salt. It is no longer necessary. But I still avoid standard table salt and favor brands that list sea salt as an ingredient.

Adding iodine has generally been a huge success.

Wikipedia: "Worldwide, iodine deficiency affects about two billion people and is the leading preventable cause of intellectual and developmental disabilities."

Wikipedia also lists sources for this claim.

Edit: if anybodys doctor told them to be careful with iodine then they should listen to their doctor instead of listening to random strangers on the internet. I'm just pointing out that there is good reasons why we started adding iodine to salt.

I am not talking about the general case. I am talking about two things: 1. The impact on me in specific, and I personally do not tolerate iodine well and 2. The impact on people with CF, who are told by their doctors to consume a high salt diet and there is zero commentary on the quality of the salt or the additives in it.

As far as I know, there are no studies on how consuming those additives in high quantities impacts this population with a genetic disorder that causes them to misprocess a number of different things.