After the COVID-19 pandemic, what seems to have caught the world’s attention is salt intake and its harmful effects on the human body.
Recently, the Indian Council for Medical Research tweeted about ways to reduce salt intake by avoiding adding salt when cooking rice or making dough, skipping pickles and table salt, and opting for substitutes for salt. salt. He rightly pointed out that children, the youngest of 12, only require 3 grams of salt a day.
The World Health Organization warned a couple of months ago that the world is off track to meet its global goal of reducing salt intake by 30% by 2025. The report shows that only 5% of member states WHO has mandatory and comprehensive sodium-reduction policies. 73% of WHO Member States lack full policy implementation. Implementing highly cost-effective sodium reduction policies could save an estimated seven million lives globally by 2030.
An unhealthy diet is the leading cause of NCDs, and excess sodium is the main culprit. WHO has suggested the following measures: reformulation of food to contain less salt; controlled procurement of high-sodium foods in public institutions such as schools, workplaces and hospitals; labeled promotion of packaged foods with low-sodium choices; achieve behavioral changes in the population through media campaigns.
WHO has also established a scorecard for various countries. According to that paper, India has no national policy but does have voluntary measures to reduce sodium. But that hasn’t recovered well over the past decade. Unfortunately, only people suffering from high blood pressure or kidney disease are advised by their personal physicians to reduce salt in their diet. The general population is not yet aware of the danger of hidden salt in ready-to-eat and packaged foods.
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Unfortunately, sodium labeling is not yet mandatory in our country. It’s also important to use the word salt rather than sodium so people can appreciate the relationship to high blood pressure. A recent study from Sweden showed a connection between salt consumption and anlerosis, even in the absence of hypertension. Atherosclerosis is a disease that blocks blood vessels. The study included 10,788 individuals between the ages of 50 and 64. Each extra gram of sodium was associated with a 9% increase in plaque in the carotid arteries that supply the brain and a 17% increase in plaque in the coronary arteries.
Recently, Salt Awareness Week was celebrated from May 15 to 21. The UK’s pioneering organisation, WASH (Global Action on Salt and Health) has spearheaded campaigns around the world. Sapiens Health Foundation, a Chennai-based NGO, has also been campaigning across India since 2010. The organization received the Notable Achievement Award from the World Hypertension League in 2014 for reducing the salt intake of the population.
Studies conducted in India so far have been conducted on a small number of about 1,000 individuals. The foundation plans to form a low-salt group and engage more than 100 doctors and food manufacturers to conduct research and reduce the sodium content of packaged foods. The foundation has already written to more than 300 food manufacturers in the country to use modern technology to extend shelf life rather than using sodium. Similarly, low-salt substitutes should be offered in various snack foods.
The foundation has also written to central government to make salt labeling mandatory and copy the UK’s signal labeling, where a red color indicates unhealthy salt content.
The United Kingdom was the first country in the world to have reduced the consumption of salt in the population. Over the past decade, the salt content of bread has been gradually reduced by 30% without people realizing it. This has led to the prevention of thousands of strokes and cardiovascular events. According to a Cochrane review, reducing dietary salt in diabetic patients is associated with slower progression of kidney disease and fewer medications needed to control blood pressure.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been major studies from China and Germany that have pointed to the association between high salt intake and decreased immunity in the body. Reducing salt in the diet is the most cost-effective measure to control noncommunicable diseases. India should become aware of this reality. Improving quality of life by avoiding strokes and heart attacks is the goal not only by prolonging longevity.
(The author is a senior nephrologist based in Chennai and president of Sapiens Health Foundation)
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