It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011)

Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by dnate on Friday January 22, 2016 @03:45AM (#10951559)

What I find interesting is that this issue about sodium being unhealthy never really reached Europe (or at least Germany). While the US was advertising "low sodium" on their products we are still mostly advertising "low fat" and have some "low carb" pioneers. It seems to me that the whole "sodium is bad" scheme was a poorly supported health tip gone viral.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by leonroy on Friday January 22, 2016 @04:03AM (#10951626)

It certainly reached the UK. I recall salt manufacturers being up in arms when the government started pushing for lower salt intake a good few years ago.

A few brave scientists even appeared onscreen to say that sugar not salt was the real problem. At the time though there was less hostility to sugar so the salt restrictions went into force and I believe the sugar lobby even were able to squash a few reports condemning excessive sugar intake.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by GordonS on Friday January 22, 2016 @05:27AM (#10951914)

Yep, here in the UK it's one of those 'facts' that everybody 'knows'.

It's so ingrained in many people that reviews such as this one will not change their attitude.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by arnoooooo on Friday January 22, 2016 @09:51AM (#10952978)

France has passed a law a few years ago that makes it mandatory to have the phrase "For your health, limit your salt, sugar and fat intake" on all ads for food.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by ableal on Friday January 22, 2016 @04:14AM (#10951673)

In my corner (Portugal), there have been noises to legislate lower salt in bread, etc. And the health professionals are definitely on board with that, they've been advising lower salt intake for blood pressure for many years.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by metafunctor on Friday January 22, 2016 @03:53AM (#10951589)

Reducing sodium intake has been a thing doctors recommend in Finland, at least. Ask any nurse, and they will tell you that sodium intake is definitely connected with high blood pressure and heart disease.

Also, they will tell you need to drink lots of milk to keep your bones strong. Also a piece of "science" on it's way out.

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by rapala on Friday January 22, 2016 @01:04PM (#10954435)

I was under the impression that many Finns have a genetical risk of hypertension. Thus studies about the link between salt intake and hypertension have been conducted, for example http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17046432. I haven't actually read the paper, but the abstract has this claim:

"During the past 30 years, the one-third decrease in the average salt intake has been accompanied by a more than 10-mm Hg fall in the population average of both systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and a 75% to 80% decrease in both stroke and coronary heart disease mortality in Finland."

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Re:It's Time to End the War on Salt (2011) by pkofod on Friday January 22, 2016 @04:01AM (#10951617)

Same in Denmark, but probably mostly amongst my parents' or grandparents' generation (I'm mid 20s).

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