Salt Assault

Think you know where sodium is hiding and how it kills? Look again A Short History of Salt As rocks go, it's not much to look at. But for much of history, dirty gray crystals of salt made the world go round, as a flavoring, as a preservative, as money: Roman legions

were sometimes paid in chunks of the stuff. Here in modern America, we're way overpaid. We eat nearly twice the sodium we should, and we can do that without even touching the salt shaker. The sodium hides in processed foods, put there by food companies to preserve products that would otherwise go bad, or to make bland or bitter food taste better, or maybe just to appeal to our craving for the stuff. Earlier this year, the Institute of Medicine, which helps set government nutrition recommendations, decided that people should try to take in about 1,500 milligrams (mg) of sodium daily, with an upper limit of 2,300 mg. Before, they recommended no more than 2,400 mg. What, Me Worry? It's more than the risk of high blood pressure and subsequent heart disease and stroke that prompted Mom to hide the shaker from Dad 20 years ago. Excessive sodium is now linked to other illnesses, such as cancer and kidney stones. American men eat more than 4,000 mg sodium a day, and it's easy to take in 7,000 without trying. You do need a little bit--about 200 mg a day--to keep fluids in balance. But all that excess sodium may...Weaken Your Bones Too much sodium makes the body excrete calcium, threatening bone density and strength, says Pao-Hwa Lin, Ph.D., a researcher at Duke University medical center. "The more you limit sodium, the less calcium you excrete," she says. Cause Stomach Cancer A report from Japan found that men with the highest salt intakes had double the risk of stomach cancer. The subjects ate lots of salted fish and pickled vegetables, not common in the United States. But Melanie Polk, director of nutrition education for the American Institute for Cancer Research, says the cancer connection may show up here as well. Mess With Your DNA Researchers from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute found that as they increase salt levels in laboratory cells, DNA strands begin to break and cell-repair mechanisms shut down. When salt concentrations return to normal, the cells begin to repair DNA again. Researchers found the same DNA damage in the kidneys of mice. The next step is to see if these results hold true for human kidneys. Cause Kidney Stones In a 5-year study, Italian researchers found that limiting protein and salt may be more effective in preventing the recurrence of calcium oxalate kidney stones than the more traditional calcium-restricted diet. Blame Salt for Your High BP? Sure We know for certain that sodium raises blood pressure. Roughly 20 percent of American adults have higher-than-optimal BP. Reducing intake by just 300 mg (about two slices of Cheddar) drops systolic pressure (the first number) by 2 to 4 points, and diastolic by 1 to 2 points, a British study shows. Triple that reduction and you triple the benefit.
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