Thread: The Salt of the Earth

Reported March 22, 2013

(Ivanhoe Newswire) ? You may think the United States tops the list of unhealthy countries, but when it comes to sodium, adults across the world are eating way too much. New research states that 75% of the world?s population eats twice as much sodium every day than is recommended by the World Health Organization.



"We hope our findings will influence national governments to develop public health interventions to lower sodium,? lead author Saman Fahimi, M.D., M.Phil., a visiting scientist at the Harvard School of Public Health's Epidemiology Department, was quoted as saying.


To estimate adults? sodium consumption around the World, researchers used 247 surveys of adult sodium intake originally a part of the 2010 Global Burden of Diseases Study.


The World Health Organization sets the recommended daily amount of sodium at 2,000 milligrams, but 99% of the World?s population surpasses this number. In fact, the only country whose population consumes less than 1,500 mg. of sodium a day is Kenya.


Although the U.S.?s sodium intake is fairly high with an average of 3,600 mg. a day, the top three countries are Kazakhstan, Mauritius, and Uzbekistan. These countries? daily sodium amounts hover around 6,000 mg a day!


So what is to blame for our high sodium consumption? Mainly, foods prepared in restaurants and the increased use of salt and soy sauce in cooking have cause the sodium levels in many people?s food to soar.


It is crucial for governments as well as individuals to lower how much sodium is in the food they are eating because too much can lead to serious health issues such as high blood pressure.


However, cutting down on salt may seem difficult to do. Some ways to restrict your sodium intake are to limit how often you eat out, be conscious of how much salt you put in dishes at home, and try to avoid foods and sauces loaded with sodium.


Source: American Heart Association's Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism and Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology and Prevention 2013 Scientific Sessions, March 2013

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Salt in pre-made meals blamed for the deaths of 1 in 10 Americans - which is ten times more than sugary drinks


With New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg locked in battle over banning sugary drinks over 16oz, a new study has identified salty foods as the real killer in America - especially among those under the age of 70.


The same research team that last week blamed sugar in soft drinks for 25,000 deaths a year in the U.S. has this week linked excessive salt consumption to nearly 2.3 million million cardiovascular deaths worldwide in 2010.


Staggeringly, the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston discovered that one in 10 Americans dies from eating too much salt - almost 250,000 a year and ten times as many as caused by sugary drinks.


'The burden of sodium is much higher than the burden of sugar-sweetened beverages,' said Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, an epidemiologist at the Harvard School of Public Health and author of both the salt and sugary drink studies.


'That?s because sugar-sweetened beverages are just one type of food that people can avoid, whereas sodium is in everything.'


Dr. Mozaffarian collected their data from 247 surveys on sodium consumption and then 107 clinical trials that measured salt's affect on blood pressure and cardiovascular disease.


He added one in three deaths caused by excessive sodium occurred before age 70. 'It?s really affecting younger adults, not just the elderly.'


The study was presented today at the American Heart Association's annual get-together in New Orleans and added weight to what is mounting evidence that packaged and processed foods have dangerous salt levels.


Mozaffarian said to ABC News he was amazed how easy it was to consume these foods and said the only alternative he saw was to cook everything from scratch - which many people do not find the time for.


However, the Salt Institute did not agree with Mozaffarian's findings as he set the ideal level of salt consumption at 1,000 milligrams per day.


That is half the upper limit recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


'This misleading study did not measure any actual cardiovascular deaths related to salt intake, since, by the authors? own admission, no country anywhere in the world consumes the low levels of salt they recommend,' Morton Satin, vice president of science and research for the Virginia-based institute said in a statement to ABC News.


Mozaffarian?s research will be published after peer review later this year.


'This is not sensational. The point is to objectively look at the impact of salt using the best possible science, and that?s what we have done.'

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