Sunday, July 10, 2011

Salt war

An article at Scientific American suggests that excess salt is not particularly dangerous to human health:

This week a meta-analysis of seven studies involving a total of 6,250 subjects in the American Journal of Hypertension found no strong evidence that cutting salt intake reduces the risk for heart attacks, strokes or death in people with normal or high blood pressure. In May European researchers publishing in the Journal of the American Medical Association reported that the less sodium that study subjects excreted in their urine — an excellent measure of prior consumption — the greater their risk was of dying from heart disease. These findings call into question the common wisdom that excess salt is bad for you, but the evidence linking salt to heart disease has always been tenuous.

Melinda Wenner Moyer, It’s Time to End the War on Salt
Reading such articles makes me think there’s no point in reading such articles: it seems that everything one knows turns out to be, at some point, wrong. (Smoke: good!) But what I know is that once one gets some distance from processed foods, they taste too dang salty.

[With apologies to The Bride of Frankenstein.]

comments: 4

Daughter Number Three said...

If you haven't already, check out the work of science journalist Gary Taubes on the whole "fat is bad" thing. I'll be writing about it some time soon.

Michael Leddy said...

I looked at his site, and all morning long I’ve been thinking that I should go buy some liverwurst.

Elaine said...

I completely agree on the 'processed foods' observation; we have noted the same thing. However, I remain very fond of any salty-savory flavors (in preference to sweets) and POPCORN is my treat of choice. I have a strong feeling that ultimately it will prove to be sedentary life-styles that do us in. Get out there and till the garden, chop some wood, shovel some manure, and pretty soon there is progress on several fronts! (and rears.)

Michael Leddy said...

Something I wrote in another post: “To sit and read and write, one must keep moving.” Tomorrow: cut the grass, before it gets too hot.