Salt: the forgotten element CASH Consensus Action on Salt and Health

Citation

(2002), "Salt: the forgotten element CASH Consensus Action on Salt and Health", Nutrition & Food Science, Vol. 32 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/nfs.2002.01732dab.015

Salt: the forgotten element CASH Consensus Action on Salt and Health

Salt: the forgotten element CASH Consensus Action on Salt and Health, Blood Pressure Unit, St George's Hospital, Cranmer Terrace, London SW17 ORE – Salt Awareness Day 29 January 2002

The salt action group Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH) held its third Salt Awareness Day. It started with a breakfast brief at the House of Commons, attended by MPs, members of the Lords, journalists, the major supermarkets, food manufacturers and other interested parties such as doctors and health professionals. Speaking at the media brief were the well-known chef Raymond Blanc and salt expert and founder of CASH, Professor Graham MacGregor, from St George's Hospital, London. The renowned Scottish chef Nick Nairn was also present to add his weight to the fact that healthy food needs very little salt added to it.

During the day health professionals around the country held their own Salt Awareness Day events. They were spreading the message that our current salt intake is bad for health, leading to elevated blood pressure, strokes, heart failure, heart attacks and other illnesses such as gastric cancer and osteoporosis (bone thinning). The main emphasis this year is how salt can often be the forgotten message when talking about a healthy diet, and how a so-called "healthy diet" is often not low in salt. CASH calculated the salt intake of a typical day's "healthy" intake which included a high fibre breakfast cereal, soup and wholemeal bread and a vegetable lasagne with salad. Because the meals included processed food and a "ready meal", the salt content was over 13 grams, over twice the recommended intake of 6 grams, yet most would agree, in all other ways, it fits in with current healthy eating guidelines.

Typically in the UK today, we eat between 9-12g of salt a day. There is much evidence to support the fact that too much salt is bad for health and that cutting our salt intake by a third could cut strokes by 22 per cent and heart attacks by 16 per cent. Additionally, the dangerous effects of salt on health has been strongly reinforced by some major studies in the last few years. The Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health and the Food Standards Agency now recommend a target for average salt intake for the adult UK population of 6g or less a day, i.e. almost half our current intake.

Yvette Cooper, Minister for Public Health said:

I congratulate CASH for drawing food manufacturers, retailers and consumers attention to the dangers of too much salt in the diet particularly its influence on blood pressure – a major risk factor for heart disease and strokes. Any reductions in blood pressure by cutting down on salt could be significant in lowering the burden of these diseases and help meet our targets for reducing heart disease and strokes. The Department of Health and the Food Standards Agency will continue to work with the food industry to help consumers who want to reduce their salt intake.

Sir John Krebs, Chairman of the Food Standards Agency, said:

The Food Standards Agency believes that public awareness about salt in foods is very important. Lowering the salt intake in people's diets is a vital step towards combating coronary heart disease – one of the UK's biggest killers. The Food Standards Agency is pleased that the UK bread industry has achieved significant reductions in the levels of salt in bread. We now want to see this example followed by others in the food industry. The Agency has already looked at various food surveys, identified key sources of dietary salt and is discussing with the food industry ways of reducing salt in other processed food.

Currently around 80 per cent of our salt intake is hidden in processed foods, including some of our so-called healthy staples such as bread and breakfast cereals; yet the general public is largely unaware of this fact. Children are especially at risk of getting a salt overload, as they are tending to eat as much salt as adults due to their high consumption of processed foods, whereas they should eat proportionately less.

Most supermarkets have made great strides in reducing the salt in their own-brands of foods, so that they contain significantly less salt than their branded counterparts. Also, many supermarkets have introduced consumer friendly labelling so that the amount of salt per portion of food can be clearly compared with the recommended intake for the day.

There is now clear evidence that reducing salt will save lives, but we cannot expect people to return to the days when meals were prepared at home from basic ingredients which are generally low in salt. Processed and convenient meals are here to stay, so food manufacturers must follow the lead of supermarkets and make these foods as healthy as possible, which includes a gradual reduction in their salt content. Evidence from salt reductions made by some supermarkets, shows that technically it can be done, and that the consumer readily accepts it and in many cases even prefers the flavour.

Professor Graham MacGregor said:

The UK is leading the world in this one area of preventive medicine, namely salt reduction. This is largely as a result of the foresight of many of the leading supermarkets in the UK. However, we still have a long way to go and the whole of the food industry now needs to respond to make gradual reduction in the salt content of processed food.

Chef Nick Nairn added:

After hearing Professor MacGregor talking on the effects of a diet with a high salt content I was sufficiently worried about the health implications of salt and set about drastically cutting my own salt intake.