It’s hard to think of salt as an addictive substance, but it is. And you thought that a small can of Campbell’s tomato soup had over 1700 mg of salt just to make it taste good. No, it’s to get you hooked on their salt-laden soup, so you buy, buy, buy.
And that would be alright except, too much salt isn’t good for you. Fifty percent (50 %) of the white race is sensitive to salt, seventy-five percent (75 %) of the black race. Sensitive to salt means that it can kill you with high blood pressure, heart disease, and strokes. Don’t think that this is news to Campbell’s, they are and have been well aware of what has going on and the dangers of a high sodium diet – yet they continued to knowingly ply you with their addictive and dangerous product to protect their profits and because it was legal.
Human Beans and human beings need about 400 mg of salt per day. More than about 1500 mg per day is dangerous, especially if you are salt sensitive, over 50, or black.
Getting on a low-salt diet of 400-1500 mg per day will bring your blood pressure down to about 115 over 75 if you are otherwise healthy. (If you have high cholesterol, you may need to be on an unsaturated fat diet as well.)
Obviously, Campbell’s soup company doesn’t care much about me or you because they could make good tasting soup with much less salt – but then we wouldn’t get addicted to their soups would we? (And if you are addicted to salt, you wouldn’t buy low salt products, would you?) Well, Campbell’s, take your salt-laden, salt-addicting, deadly soups and keep them, I make my own soups with little or no salt and they are truly delicious. Yum, yum!
Since most of you are addicted to salt, almost all soup makers as well as well as makers of most other foods you buy, put in lots of salt and go along with your addiction and their bottom lines.
Well, 40 years ago, I decided that I wasn’t going to be addicted to salt-laden, deadly food, so I have been on a low-salt diet ever since. It just really ticked me off to have some money grubber try to addict me to their product and not care if it killed me or not. Now, the rest of the world may catch up (see below) with the money-grubbing purveyors of salt-laden addictive foods.
Actually, It looks to me that it may be 40 more years before any effective government action is taken to stop the poisoning and killing by excessive, addicting salt, so each of you is going to have to take matters into your own hands and conquer your addiction to salt on your own.
But, if your blood pressure is 115 over 75 or lower, and you’re not on any blood-pressure lowering medicine that has horrendous side effects, why worry?
Here are some Quotes from an article by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 29, 2007
WASHINGTON — Best known for deciding whether medications are safe and effective, the Food and Drug Administration is weighing whether to crack down on plain old salt, which doctors say is harmful in the quantities most Americans consume.An increasingly vocal medical community has joined consumer groups to demand government intervention, and the review could lead to federal limits on the salt content of processed foods such as canned soups and breakfast cereals.
At issue is whether the FDA should change its official classification of salt as “GRAS” — Generally Recognized as Safe — and instead declare it a food additive subject to limitations.
FDA officials say they view excess salt in the diet as a serious public health issue, but the agency is keeping its options open.“We certainly recognize that it’s a big problem for a lot of people, and consumers should have choices if they want to reduce their salt intake,” said Laura Tarantino, director of the FDA’s office of food additive safety, who is taking a leading role in the agency’s review.Too much sodium has been linked in scientific studies to high blood pressure, a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke.The National Academy of Sciences recommends that adults consume no more than 2,300 milligrams of sodium daily, roughly the amount in a teaspoon of salt. The target is lower — 1,500 milligrams — for people at higher risk for high blood pressure, including those over 50 and African Americans.
The AMA cites estimates that 150,000 lives could be saved annually if the nation were to reduce its sodium consumption by 50%, a goal the doctors’ group says can be attained within a decade.
But Jacobson said his group’s research shows that the sodium content of the same types of packaged foods can vary dramatically. For example, Contadina tomato paste has 237% more salt than Hunt’s — although Contadina tomato sauce has 33% less sodium than Hunt’s. Such findings suggest there’s room to lower sodium levels without affecting taste, Jacobson said.
In Finland, government and industry have collaborated to bring about a 40% decrease in sodium consumption since the late 1970s, according to the AMA. In the United Kingdom, government regulators set voluntary sodium reduction targets for about 70 kinds of processed foods.
ricardo.alonso-zaldivar@latimes.com
