Salt

Why is salt important?

Too much salt The amount of salt that we eat has a direct effect on our blood pressure. The more salt we eat, the higher our blood pressure. This is true, not only in people with high blood pressure, but also in people with normal blood pressure. A high salt intake also causes other health damage such as greater retention of water in your body, which leads to swelling of the ankles. Too much salt also worsens thinning of the bones (osteoporosis), asthma and kidney disease and is closely related to cancer of the stomach. Therefore, everyone should cut the amount of salt they eat.

The Department of Health and Food Standards Agency recommend that everyone should cut their salt intake from the current amount of 10 to 12 grams of salt a day to 5 to 6 grams a day, or less. If you can reduce salt intake more, this will lower your blood pressure further.

How can I reduce the amount of salt I eat?

The salt that you put into your own cooking or add at the table is obvious, but only about a quarter or less ofthe salt we eat comes from salt that we have control over. The rest comes from processed food. Salt is hidden in processed foods and most people are unaware of how much salt is added to these types of food. You can either cut down or cut out processed foods. Read the label on these foods, and only eat those that do not contain large amounts of added salt.

Your taste buds get used to the large amount of salt in processed foods. When you stop, food with less salt will taste bland. However, your taste buds adapt very quickly so that after about three weeks you will find that food with added salt tastes very unpleasant and may mask the real flavour of the food.

There are three ways to cut down on the amount of salt that you eat and improve your health:

Do not add salt to your food at the table

Sea, rock, and garlic salt are almost identical to salt and should not be used. Most sauces used at the table are also very high in salt, eg, tomato ketchup, soy sauce.

Do not add salt to cooking

This includes not adding salt to the water you use for vegetables, pasta and rice, etc, and avoiding stock cubes, gravy browning, soy sauce and salted dried fish, all of which are very high in salt.

Avoid manufactured or processed foods that have salt added

This is the most difficult as there is a large amount of salt in processed or packaged food and it is difficult to know from the food labels how much has been added. For example, the main source of salt in our diet in the UK comes from bread and some cereals.

Foods that are high in salt include:

Bread
Breakfast cereals
Processed meat products (sausages, pasties, pies, bacon, etc)
Soups
Ready prepared meals and instant foods
Sandwiches
Some restaurant and takeaway food

Mineral salts containing potassium

There are salt alternatives that contain both sodium and potassium chloride, such as Lo-Salt®. These are usually known as a mineral salt. They contain less sodium than ordinary salt and have potassium instead of sodium. It is better not to use salt at all, but if you find that you cannot give up salt, it is better to use one of these salt alternatives than salt itself.

If you have kidney disease you should check with your doctor before using a salt alternative, as a large increase in potassium intake could have harmful effects.

Cutting down on salt is worth it. The less salt you eat, the lower your blood pressure is likely to be and once you are used to it, you will begin to taste the real natural flavour of foods.

Need To Know More?
Click here to download the leaflet How to eat less salt.

The Association has an information booklet, Healthy Eating and Blood Pressure, which contains more detailed information on how to eat less salt. Contact us for a copy.

For details of a diet plan that can help you to lower your blood pressure have a look at the DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) web site. Click here to visit the site.

For more information on Salt, visit the Consensous Action Against Salt (CASH) site

The Food Standards Agency have launched a national campaign to raise awareness of the dangers of salt and to provide information to the public on how to reduce their salt intake. For more information click here to go to the Food Standards Agency web site.

Page checked: 13/7/05
Page updated: 13/7/05