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Cutting back on salt could save 100,000 lives per year.
RODALE NEWS, WASHINGTON, DC—It's no secret that there is too much salt in the typical American diet. But for the first time, the federal government is looking for ways to counter that trend by controlling the levels of sodium permitted in packaged and restaurant food. A report released yesterday by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) has told the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) it should undertake this change as soon as possible, in order to prevent hypertension, heart disease, and stroke. The change would also affect food regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, such as meat and poultry. This is an about-face from the government’s long-held position that sodium falls into a category of generally recognized as safe (GRAS), which means that there are no limits to the amount that can be used in processed foods.
THE DETAILS: The government’s Dietary Guidelines recommend that healthy adults consume no more than 2,300 milligrams (mg) of sodium a day. And soon it will advise people who are over 50 years old to consume no more than 1,500 mg a day. Most Americans consume far too much salt, at least 3,400 mg daily—and almost 80 percent of that comes from processed foods. School lunches have an average of 1,000 mg of sodium.
The toll of all that excess salt is quite high. A recent study said that if Americans cut back to the recommended 2,300 daily mg, it could prevent 100,000 deaths a year and reduce healthcare costs by $18 billion.
For those who don’t prepare meals from scratch—in other words, most of us—sticking to the recommended levels while eating processed food is virtually impossible. The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), which been has beating the drum about the risk from high sodium consumption for decades, has produced a chart of the 10 saltiest foods: A meal of Hungry-Man Grilled Bourbon Steak Strips with sauce and rice and green beans wins top honors with its 1,990 mg. Kraft Easy Mac microwaveable macaroni and cheese dinner, at number 10, packs 1,050 mg. While those may be the saltiest examples, relying on almost any processed foods will quickly shoot you past the healthy limit. Even one cup of most packaged soups contains 700 mg, and many have as much as 1,000 mg.
As Michael Jacobson, director of the CSPI, sees it, “the overconsumption of sodium is “the greatest problem in the American diet.”
WHAT IT MEANS: Many voices have been calling for a reduction in America's salt intake. But this announcement may herald a new urgency. The food industry began its own effort to incrementally reduce sodium in processed foods over the last year. But the IOM report said voluntary efforts over a 40-year period have failed. Working with the food industry and health experts, the FDA has made plans to reduce sodium levels incrementally over a 10-year period, so that consumers will not be aware of the changes—and because of food-safety questions and other technical difficulties involved in removing salt. But Senator Tom Harkin, (D-Iowa) and Representative Rosa De Lauro, (D-Conn.), both of whom have been involved with the nutrition and food-safety issues for years, don’t think it should take 10 years to bring the sodium levels down to a healthy number.
Most of us should not consume
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