Eating too salty, taking too muchSaltpoints, in the long run it will causehypertension, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer and other diseases. Fortunately, there is “salt-removing food“It can help the body lighten the load.
highSaltDiet increases mortality and may also lead to 5 chronic diseases
People often hear that you should eat less salt and not too salty. Does salt have no special health benefits other than seasoning? In fact, it is very important to add some salt to your diet.
The main component of table salt is sodium chloride, including 40% sodium,60% chlorine. Sodium is an essential element for the normal functioning of the human body. It maintains normal osmotic pressure in the body, regulates pH in the body, transmits nerves, contracts and relaxes muscles, and maintains a regular heartbeat.
Human sweat and tears have a salty taste, which is related to sodium. When people exercise strenuously, the sodium in the body will be excreted in large quantities with sweat. If the salt is not replenished immediately, it will cause symptoms such as cramps.
Therefore, the human body needs to supplement the right amount of sodium every day to maintain the body’s function. The current recommended daily intake of sodium for adults is 2300 mg, which is less than 6 grams of salt.
However, people often eat too much salt. long term,The risk of death also rose.The CDC Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention Group published a large study that followed 12,267 American adults for 15 years and found that those with the highest sodium intake had a 20% higher all-cause mortality rate than those with the lowest sodium intake.[1]
Too much salt over a long period of time can also increase the risk of many chronic diseases:
1. hypertensionand cardiovascular disease
Dietitian Chen Yiting pointed out that the main effects of eating too much salt on the body are high blood pressure and increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
Excessive sodium in the human body is excreted by the kidneys. Excessive intake of salt will increase the burden on the kidneys. If the kidneys cannot excrete enough sodium, sodium will accumulate in the body. At this time, the human body must absorb a large amount of water to maintain the osmotic pressure balance, and the volume of the entire blood will increase, which will increase the blood pressure and increase the burden on the heart.
If the circulatory system is in this condition for a long time, it can harden the blood vessels, leading to high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke, and even heart failure.[2]
2. Chronickidney disease
Eating too much salt can cause high blood pressure, and high blood pressure is chronickidney diseaserisk factors. A meta-analysis in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases found that people with high blood pressure had a 76 percent higher risk of developing chronic kidney disease compared with individuals with normal blood pressure.[3]
A high-salt diet can increase the risk of kidney disease. In addition to high blood pressure, eating too much salt can directly damage theHarmfulkidneydirty，Including causing proteinuria, decreased glomerular filtration rate.[4]
3. Diabetes
Chen Yiting said that long-term intake of too much sodium will affect the secretion of insulin, thereby causing diabetes.
Results of a medical record and questionnaire survey of 13,000 adults in Tokyo, Japan showed that the cumulative incidence of diabetes was significantly higher in the high-calorie and high-salt intake group compared with subjects in the high-calorie and low-salt intake group .[5]
In fact, high-salt diets have been found to be associated with metabolic diseases such as obesity, insulin resistance, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.[6][7][8]
4. Osteoporosis
A high-salt diet not only hurts, hurts the kidneys, but also hurts the bones.
When the sodium content in the body is too high, the urinary calcium excretion will also increase. In order to maintain the calcium concentration in the blood, the body will automatically leak calcium from the bones into the blood, which will cause osteoporosis in the long run.
A study from South Korea found that urinary sodium excretion was inversely related to bone health, and women were the most vulnerable to a high-salt diet.[9]
A study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in postmenopausal women showed that bone loss can be reduced if urinary sodium excretion is reduced.[10]
An animal study found that long-term excessive salt intake leads to an increase in the number of osteoclasts, a decrease in the number of osteoblasts, and a decrease in osteoid volume, resulting in impaired bone quality and integrity.[11]
5. Gastric cancer
According to the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF), excessive salt intake is associated with an increase in gastric cancer. For example, salted meat and fish, salted vegetables, etc., when people eat more of these foods, the greater the chance of stomach cancer.
The reason is that salt damages the stomach lining and causes lesions that, if left unchecked, can turn into stomach cancer. In addition, the infection of stomach Helicobacter pylori will also damage the stomach wall and cause stomach cancer. If you eat too much salt at the same time, it will make the stomach condition worse.[12]
eat highPotassiumFoods help flush out salt, lower risk of death
When eating too salty, there is one type of nutrient that helps expel the salt from the body, and that isPotassium。the bestsalt-removing foodIt’s high potassium foods.
Contrary to sodium, Chen Yiting pointed out that supplementing more potassium can lower blood pressure and prevent cardiovascular disease. It can also eliminate sodium, maintain sodium and potassium balance in the body, and reduce the negative effects of high sodium intake.
In a study published in the Journal of Cardiovascular Pharmacology, 23 hypertensive patients were divided into two groups for one month without changing their dietary sodium and potassium intake. Potassium tablets and placebo were administered. As a result, the average blood pressure in the potassium supplement group decreased by 4% compared to the placebo group.[13]
The researchers also asked 12 hypertensive patients with fixed sodium and potassium intakes to take potassium tablets for 12 consecutive days and found that potassium supplementation resulted in immediate sodium excretion, with an average sodium excretion of 110 millimoles (mmol) per patient.
The body needs far more potassium than sodium every day, but people usually don’t get enough. A large Harvard study found that increasing potassium intake and decreasing sodium intake were associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular disease. Studies have shown that an increase in urinary potassium excretion of 1,000 mg per day (meaning an increase in intake) is associated with an 18% lower risk of cardiovascular disease.[14]
Those with the highest potassium intake had a 20% lower risk of all-cause mortality, including cardiovascular disease, than those with the lowest intake.[1]
The following are salt-depleting foods that are high in potassium:
fruit:Bananas, cantaloupe, papaya, cherry tomatoes, kiwi, citrus, durian.
vegetable:Spinach, sweet potato leaves, celery, chrysanthemum, Sichuan seven, water spinach, red amaranth, amaranth, beets.
Starch:Potato, yam, pumpkin, taro, sweet potato.
Snacks and drinks:Original nut seeds, dark chocolate, coffee, green tea, red bean water.
The disadvantage of high-potassium vegetables is that during cooking, some potassium is lost into the soup. And people often add too much salt and other processed seasonings when cooking. Chen Yiting suggested that you can make good use of natural spices such as onion, ginger, garlic, chili, pepper, rosemary, coriander, tomato, lemon, star anise, Italian spices, etc., to reduce the amount of seasonings.
Another way to supplement potassium is to make green lattes with high-potassium vegetables and fruits so that potassium is not lost during cooking. However, in the combination of green latte, the proportion of vegetables is more than that of fruits. (Recommended reading:These foods burn fat and boost metabolism!Homemade 3 drinks to lose weight while drinking）
Fruits, snacks and drinks with potassium content should still pay attention to the intake and avoid eating too much sugar and fat.
Don’t eat too salty?Beware of unsalted high-sodium foods
In addition to salt-removing foods, it is still necessary to reduce sodium intake in the diet and eat less processed foods. This is a relatively healthy eating pattern.
To avoid consuming too much salt, eat less processed foods in the first place. A survey from the United States found that most of the salt people eat comes from commercially processed foods, rather than salt added when cooking at home.[2]
Common high-sodium processed foods include: ham, bacon, hot dogs, sausages, bacon, meat floss, jerky, hot pot ingredients, pickled foods, instant noodles, canned food, potato chips, etc.
Many foods that don’t taste salty, such as sweet and sour preserves and dried fruit, are actually high in sodium. Baked goods such as bread, cakes and biscuits that people often eat are also made with salt.
To avoid accidentally eating high-sodium processed foods, pay attention to the nutrition label on the package. Chen Yiting pointed out,Foods containing more than 600 mg of sodium per 100 grams or milliliters of food are considered high-sodium foods.
In addition to processed foods, there are also high-sodium foods in the freshly cooked food that people eat in restaurants and snack bars. For example: pizza, burritos, lo-mei, barbecue, beef noodles, hot pot, risotto, soup dishes, soups, salty chicken, etc.
Chen Yiting reminded that the salt of some foods mainly comes from its dipping sauce or dipping sauce, such as tomato sauce, sauce for dumplings and pot stickers, and salad dressing. For a refreshing salad, the sauce is high in sodium, even with vinaigrette.
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Responsible editor: Li Qingfeng