Forget Salt
From May:
A new JAMA study finds a strong correlation: the third of folks who eat the least salt die over three times as often as the third of folks who eat the most salt. (more)
Now:
[A] new analysis … conducted …. for the Cochrane Collaboration … analyzed 167 studies conducted between 1950 and 2011 that compared people who consumed low-sodium versus high-sodium diets. Low-sodium diets did cut blood pressure levels in people with high and normal blood pressure. … But it also significantly increased other risk factors for heart disease, such as cholesterol levels, triglycerides, adrenaline and renin, the researchers reported in the American Journal of Hypertension. “These results do not support that sodium reduction may have net beneficial effects in a population of Caucasians.” (more; study)
The official response is no change in official advice:
U.S. health officials recommend that adults get no more than 2,300 mg of sodium daily. … “We eat a lot of sodium — way too much — and I don’t think it’s going to hurt anybody to lower sodium in the current American diet,” Penny Kris-Etherton, a spokesperson for the American Heart Association [said]. (more)
Well, I just happen to be one of those people who is sensitive to salt. So what are we supposed to do? Eat gruel while everything else is filled with salt?
I understand the impulse, but there needs to be a reasonable way for people like me to eat while keeping my dealings with salt to a minimum. After all, we don't hide other allergens in the environment. We notify so that people can deal with them accordingly. Why not the same respect to salt?
I believe those numbers are mmol of sodium, which means to get mg we multiply by the atomic weight of sodium (23). So these are low=2760mg, medium=4370mg, high=6670mg. Average american salt consumption is about 3400mg/day. So the high value here is not less than the average of the usa population.
A full pdf of the study is here