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Scientists urge UN to reduce global salt consumption in the next 10 years
Last reviewed: 30.06.2025
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Scientists are calling on the United Nations to focus on reducing salt consumption worldwide over the next 10 years.
Cutting salt intake by 15% could prevent 8.5 million deaths worldwide in the next decade, according to a study published in the British Medical Journal.
The authors of the paper call on the UN to pay attention to the fact that, after the fight against smoking, reducing excess salt in people's diets is the most effective way to improve the health of the planet's population.
According to scientists, it is better to reduce people's salt consumption not through social advertising, but through government regulation of their food industry. Most of the salt that enters the human body with food is added during the production of products at food factories.
If previously there were doubts about the negative impact of salt on human health, the authors of the report write, now there is no point in arguing about this topic.
The fact that salt increases blood pressure and increases the risk of cardiovascular diseases has long been known - this is confirmed by numerous studies. Now the world must think about how to significantly reduce salt consumption in practice, scientists believe.
In America alone, cutting salt consumption by just over a third could save the health care system up to $24 billion a year and save tens of thousands of lives.
But given the fact that 70% of all heart attacks and strokes occur in developing countries, the effect of reducing salt in food will be global, the authors of the study believe.
However, the salt industry's representative body, the North American Salt Institute, dismisses the study's findings, saying the need to reduce salt intake is a myth based on popular misconceptions rather than hard science.
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