Will the feds ever stop feeding us that low-salt myth?
For years our government has pushed a low-sodium diet that’s been disproven by science… is dangerous for our health… and has practically taken all the joy out of mealtime.
And now they’re coming for our kids.
A new CDC report is calling for major sodium restrictions for school-aged children. It makes all the same tired threats about how salt is going to condemn our kids to lives of high blood pressure and heart disease.
But it looks like there’s another report on salt and kids that the folks at the CDC haven’t read — but I have.
It proves once and for all that you can ignore everything the CDC, the American Heart Association and the rest of the low-salt lobby tells you about sodium limits for your kids and grandkids.
And for you.
You see, both the CDC and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) are housed under the exact same agency — the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
And while the CDC was offering its new guidance on low-sodium diets for children, a study from the NHLBI was shedding light on what happens to kids who totally ignore the CDC’s advice.
And the answer is — nothing. Absolutely nothing.
The NHLBI study tracked more than 2,000 girls (they were all 9 or 10 when the research started) for a full decade. And girls who regularly consumed 3,500 mg. or more sodium a day didn’t have higher blood pressure.
That 3,500 mg. of salt is 50 percent more than the 2,300 mg. limit set by the CDC (and, incidentally, more than twice the ridiculous and dangerous 1,500 mg. guideline set by the American Heart Association).
But despite the CDC’s warning that “higher sodium intake in children” could lead to hypertension, heart disease and stroke, NHLBI researchers couldn’t find any relationship whatsoever between eating more salt and blood pressure. And that’s something I’ve been telling you for years.
You see, the CDC’s 2,300 mg. guideline comes from a terribly misguided plan called Healthy People 2020. When it was released in late 2010, the report was called a “10-year agenda for improving the nation’s health.”
But researchers have found that Healthy People 2020 is nothing but a recipe for shortening our lives. The NHLBI research is just one of several studies proving that cutting salt doesn’t lower your blood pressure and that low-sodium diets can be downright deadly for children and adults.
In fact, research out of Belgium a few years ago found that a low-salt diet can increase your risk of early death by as much as 500 percent! And a study last year in the New England Journal of Medicine looked at over 100,000 adults for three years and found that going under 3,000 mg. of sodium a day will put you at a big risk for heart attacks and strokes.
The average American consumes about 3,400 mg. of sodium daily, which is just fine. In fact, people who eat between 3,000 mg. and 6,000 mg. of salt a day — far above what our government recommends — have the lowest risk of death from heart disease.
So before you buy into the CDC’s latest guidance on salt, remember what we’ve been telling you for years. The science behind those guidelines has been totally debunked. And not just by independent researchers — but now by our own government, too.
Sources:
“EdibleRX: The salty truth about sodium” Keith Ayoob EdD, RD, July 2, 2015, Medpage Today, medpagetoday.com
“School-aged children eat too much sodium, CDC report finds” Azza AbuDagga, M.H.A., Ph.D., June 2015, Health Letter, citizen.org
“90% of Americans eat too much salt” Alexandra Sifferlin, July 2, 2015, Time, time.com
