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releases

04/10/2004

Salt Industry Offers to Fund New Research

The Salt Manufacturer's Association has today (Monday 4 October) told the Government that it will contribute towards the cost of research needed to provide the nation with scientific certainty on the debate over salt and health.

The offer has been made in a letter to Melanie Johnson, the Parliamentary Under Secretary for Public Health. It comes at a time when professional concern is growing that the Food Standards Agency's £4 million slug-led salt campaign is based on questionable conclusions.

"The FSA would have us all believe that there is a consensus amongst the experts over the effects of salt on blood pressure," says SMA general secretary, Peter Sherratt. "The reality is that there is a significant body of opinion in the UK and internationally that disagrees.

"If you were introducing a new drug you would not be able to do so without the backing of proper research, so how can the Government justify changing the dietary habits of a nation when there is any doubt?

" There is also medical opinion that says that the elderly, in particular, may actually be at risk from reacting to blanket advice to cut their salt intake. Only last week at a conference in Vienna, one of the European experts on geriatric care, Professor Ingo Füsgen, warned that up to 10 per cent of elderly people suffer from sub-acute sodium deficiency.

The Food Standards Agency's current campaign is particularly questionable in the light of the Department of Health's own National Diet and Nutrition Survey, which confirmed that there is little or no benefit to the general public in reducing salt intake. This conclusion was echoed in the recent, prestigious Cochrane Review as well as in numerous other studies over recent years. The NDNS study, when conjoined with the recent NICE report, concludes that 'if you are hypertensive, use modern effective drugs; if you are not, salt restriction will not benefit you'. They do not provide a mandate for the current policy of universal sodium restriction.

When they announced the National Diet and Nutrition Survey findings in February 2004, Melanie Johnson and the head of the Food Standards Agency, Sir John Krebs, said 'the results will be used to develop nutritional policy and contribute to the evidence base for Government advice on health eating.'

'The SMA agrees that health policy should be based on an evidence-based scientific approach,' said Mr Sherratt. 'That is why we are proposing to the Minister that there should be an independent, evidence-based review. Such a study would cost a fraction of their current campaign budget and could produce agreed, long term consensus. We have told the Minister that we would happily contribute."

media contacts

Barrie Hedges, Daybreak Communications 0845 644 3845
or mobile 07899 623756 barrie.hedges@daybreakcomm.co.uk 

references

• The Department of Health's own National Diet and Nutrition Survey published earlier this year concluded that there is no correlation between systolic blood pressure and urinary sodium.
• The 1988 Intersalt study is one of the prime motivators for the current campaign, yet it failed to prove its own primary hypothesis that systolic blood pressure is associated directly with sodium excretion.
• Several large-scale intervention studies have shown that restriction of sodium in the diet has no effect on diastolic blood pressure and only a minimal effect on systolic blood pressure.
• The National Health Service's own website includes an evaluation of a report recommending salt restriction. It concluded that the calculations are "theoretical" and that the authors have "over-emphasised" a key section. The reviewers suggest that further research is needed.
• Since 1995, 10 studies in the United States have reported on whether low sodium diets produce health benefits. All 10 indicate that, among the general population, lower sodium diets don't produce health benefits. In fact, not a single study has ever shown improved health outcomes for broad populations on reduced sodium diets.
• An independent review by the Cochrane Library (2004) of advice to reduce dietary salt for prevention of cardiovascular disease concludes: "Intensive interventions, unsuited to primary care or population prevention programmes, provide only minimal reductions in blood pressure during long-term trials. Further evaluations to assess effects on morbidity and mortality outcomes are needed for populations as a whole and for patients with elevated blood pressure".

notes to editor

1 The Salt Manufacturers' Association is the trade association representing UK manufacturers of salt, including domestic salt, catering salt, water-softening salt, industrial salt and de-icing salt.

2 The UK salt industry produces some two-and-a-half to three million tonnes of salt in a typical year. The greatest proportion (rock salt) is used for de-icing roads in winter. Smaller percentages are used in the chemicals, food manufacturing and pharmaceutical industries and for the softening of water. It has been estimated that salt is used in manufacturing 14,000 products. SMA members employ a total of some 750 people in the UK, the majority in Cheshire but also in the North East and in Northern Ireland.

3 Further information to support this release is available from www.saltsense.co.uk. The media resources available there also include downloadable photographs.