London - If we could end our love affair with salt we would save tens of thousands of lives in Britain and millions around the world, researchers say.
Halving daily consumption from 9-12g per day - the goal set a decade ago - could prevent 35 000 deaths in the UK and 2.5 million globally.
Professor Graham MacGregor of the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine at Barts and the London Medical School, a lifelong campaigner on the dangers of salt and the author of a review of 34 trials involving 3 000 adults published on Friday in the British Medical Journal, said the findings showed a “modest reduction” in salt consumption led to significant falls in blood pressure.
“This will… reduce strokes, heart attacks, and heart failure. Furthermore, our analysis shows a dose-response relation — that is, the greater the reduction in salt intake, the greater the fall in blood pressure,” Professor MacGregor and colleagues said.
The World Health Organisation recommends salt consumption is reduced to 5-6g a day but Professor MacGregor says this does not go far enough. He is backed by the National Institute for Care and Health Excellence (NICE) which recommends a daily limit of 3g for the UK.
Doubts about the wisdom of reducing salt have been raised in the last two years by rival researchers. A review of 167 studies by Niels Graudal of University of Copenhagen in 2011 found while cutting salt reduced blood pressure, it increased hormones and fats in the blood that “could be harmful if persistent over time.”
Professor MacGregor said the review was flawed because many of the trials were short term and thus irrelevant in the context of a public health.
READ THE LABEL: TIPS FOR CUTTING BACK
The obvious way is to bin the salt shaker, but this has less effect than widely thought. The salt added at the dining table accounts for just 20 percent of our daily consumption. The remaining 80 percent comes from processed food - such as cheese, bread or pizza - and is added by manufacturers. The result is most people consume far more salt than they realise. The first step to salt reduction is to read the label, then try to choose low salt alternatives. The simple message is: eat green. - The Independent