Salt Mines and Caves
These natural deposits of mineral halite are derived from evaporated ancient lakes and seas. The unrefined rock salt, primarily sodium chloride, also includes varying concentrations of other mineral salts such as calcium and magnesium, manganese and sulfates which have additional therapeutic properties, depending on the source.
The special characteristics of the micro-climate of a salt mine include stable air temperature, humidity and lack of airborne pollutants such as pollens, and is unique to each mine. At depth the air pressure is also significantly higher than above ground which has been found to benefit sufferers of respiratory diseases in studies conducted at the Dead Sea which is below sea level.
There are records of improvements in the breathing of miners in Roman and medieval times. Dr Feliks Boczkowski — a physician at the Polish salt mine at Wieliczka — wrote in 1843 that the miners there did not suffer from lung diseases and his successor set up a spa based upon these observations. Modern use of this therapy started in Germany when Dr. Karl Hermann Spannagel noticed improvement in the health of his patients after they hid in the Kluterthöhle karst cave to escape heavy bombing. It is now practised in places such as Bystrianska in Slovakia, Wieliczka in Poland, Solotvyno in Ukraine and many other East European countries.
Read more about this topic: Salt Therapy
Famous quotes containing the words salt, mines and/or caves:
“When the salt sheet broke in a storm of singing
The voices of all the drowned swam on the wind.”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)
“The humblest observer who goes to the mines sees and says that gold-digging is of the character of a lottery; the gold thus obtained is not the same thing with the wages of honest toil. But, practically, he forgets what he has seen, for he has seen only the fact, not the principle, and goes into trade there, that is, buys a ticket in what commonly proves another lottery, where the fact is not so obvious.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“A jellyfish and a saurian,
And caves where the cave men dwell;
Then a sense of law and beauty,
And a face turned from the clod—
Some call it Evolution,
And others call it God.”
—William Herbet Carruth (1859–1929)