As our food environment changed,salt became more available and manufacturers capitalised on our hardwired desire for it by adding to everything from desserts to cereals,soups to snacks,leaving our tastebuds in a permanent state of salty thirst.
Overconsumption of salt is bad for us,but few people are cutting back. Could “heart” salt be a solution?iStock
But too much salt is as detrimental as too little and experts have been aware that we are overconsuming the ingredient for the last century. Too much sodium leads to more fluid in the blood vessels,as the body attempts to dilute it,resulting in higher blood pressure.
Attempts to tell people to ease off on the salt have been unsuccessful,in part because of our intake comes from pre-packaged,pre-salted foods. The average Australian eats the daily (no more than a teaspoon of salt).
In a new editorial,published on Monday in the American Heart Association’s scientific journalHypertension,an international group of experts is instead suggesting people substitute table salt (sodium chloride) with low-sodium potassium-enriched salt,also referred to as “heart” salt.
Bruce Neal,executive director at The George Institute Australia and professor of clinical epidemiology at Imperial College London has been researching the alternative for 20 years.
“It’s a product that looks like,tastes like,can be used just like regular salt,but it doesn’t have as much sodium,” Neal explains,adding that enriching it with potassium – a mineral found in beans,bananas,dark leafy greens and even potatoes –.
In a led by Neal,participants who were randomly assigned heart salt (25 per cent potassium chloride,75 per cent sodium chloride) had a lower risk of stroke,major cardiovascular events and death from any cause than participants who used regular salt.
As it was still three quarters regular salt,most people couldn’t taste the difference,but it still led to a blood pressure reduction that drove other health benefits. “And in that study we had people followed for five years and 93 per cent of them were still using the potassium enriched salt at the end of the study,” he says.
As many as one in three Australian adults have high blood pressure and even those who aren’t diagnosed with hypertension,but have elevated blood pressure,have increased risk of health problems.
“Even if you only drop[blood pressure] by one or two per cent across the population,you prevent thousands and thousands of strokes and heart attacks every year because blood pressure’s such a strong risk factor,” he adds. “From a public health perspective,it’s tremendous.”
Last year,the in its top four ways to combat chronic disease.
“Unhealthy diets are a leading cause of death and disease globally,and excessive sodium intake is one of the main culprits,” Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus,WHO Director-General,said in a statement.
Although potassium-enriched salt is available in supermarkets and costs about the same as pricier pink sea salts,the experts are now calling for it to be recommended in global heart guidelines.
Currently,only the Chinese and European heart health guidelines make a specific recommendation for using potassium-enriched salt.
“I’m sure it will be considered in all the guidelines that are being updated at the moment including the very influential American one,” says Professor Garry Jennings,chief medical adviser at the National Heart Foundation.
“It’s not a one-stop solution but given the scale of the problem and given we haven’t made much headway we need to include everything we know would help...[and] it has quite a significant potential benefit.”
Updated guidelines would also make it easier to have discussions with the food industry about reformulating products to substitute table salt with heart salt,Jennings adds. Until then,the experts are working with the medical industry to recommend patients with hypertension use heart salt (unless they have kidney disease) and working to make it more available for anyone to buy in grocery stores.
High blood pressure,Neal adds,is not inevitable.
“If you look at remote tribes,their blood pressure when they’re 60 at the same as when they’re 16,it doesn’t go up,” he says. “One of the main reasons why blood pressure goes up with age is almost certainly because of chronic overconsumption of sodium.”
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