Focus

Artwork by Jordan Melcher

Salt Controversy

“Most Americans consume too much salt in their daily diet.” -Heather DeWaard-Flickinger NIACC Personal Wellness instructor

Corey Smith
For the Logosr

To some extent, everyone takes in salt. Some individuals consume less, eating only the salt that comes from the food they eat, while others pour it on food like frosting on a cake.

Many foods that are processed contain high levels of salt, which if consumed regularly can become unhealthy and lead to dangerous consequences.

Those potential consequences are largely the reason for what is being recommended by the United States Food and Drug Administration.

“The head of the Food and Drug Administration says reducing salt in the diets of Americans is a ‘very important public health priority,’” according to an Associated Press news release posted on KIMT.com

The Institute of Medicine has recently urged the FDA to “set maximum sodium levels for different foods in a stepwise rollback, so people could adjust to the change,” according to the Associated Press article.

The FDA will be working with the food industry to implement voluntary reductions in processed food.

“Salt is good for our bodies for many different things,” Ted Weiland, a chemistry instructor at North Iowa Area Community College, said. “It helps with muscle and cellular function.”

Although salt has important jobs within our bodies, it also can cause problems.

“Too much salt in the diet can increase a person’s risk for high blood pressure. Over time, high blood pressure makes the heart work harder than normal which can lead to heart disease, stroke and other health conditions,” Heather DeWaard-Flickinger, NIACC Personal Wellness instructor, said.

“Not taking in enough salt can lead to decreased muscle function, while too much can also lead to dehydration, so a balance is needed,” Weiland said.

However, that balance is hard to achieve.

“Most Americans consume too much salt in their daily diet,” DeWaard-Flickinger said.

The American Heart Association recommends that individuals take in no more than 1,500 mg of salt daily. They say, on average, Americans consume 3,436 mg a day.

It may be believed that most salt in an individual’s diet comes from what the individual applies to food. However, that is not correct.

Only about six percent of salt that individuals consume comes from what they add to their food compared to 77 percent received from processed food, according to mayoclinic.com.

“If you ask me, I think it’s ridiculous,” Weiland said concerning what the FDA is attempting to do to limit salt consumption. “It bothers me from a personal responsibility standpoint.”

While many will agree with Weiland, believing that individuals should be able to choose how much salt they take in, others will recognize some of the dangers that DeWaard-Flickinger pointed out.

“I think it may be a good idea to put a limit on how much sodium processed foods can contain,” DeWaard-Flickinger said. “There are many ways to lower salt in a person’s diet; one way is limiting how much sodium that person consumes from processed foods.”

In a different article by the Associated Press posted in The Des Moines Register, these steps will not be tasted for a while.

Plans are being made, and it will be a gradual process of weaning salt from diets so that industry recipes along with production methods can be modified.

“When I will look at food labels while at the grocery store, I am shocked at how much sodium some products contain,” DeWaard-Flickinger said.  “If the FDA puts an upper limit it may help lower the amount of sodium people consume on a daily basis.”