WASHINGTON — Fueling America’s long and dangerous love affair with salty food may be coming to an end.
After more than 40 years of failed efforts to reduce salt in processed and restaurant food voluntarily, a new report calls on the Food and Drug Administration to establish mandatory standards that gradually reduce sodium content in the nation’s food supply.
The report by the Institute of Medicine recommends that the FDA, working with the food industry, limit the amount of salt that restaurants, food manufacturers and food service companies could add to their products.
In a statement, the FDA said it hadn’t decided whether to move on the report.
“We believe we can achieve some substantial voluntary reductions,” Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg said Tuesday. “We are shaping a strategy, and that strategy involves working in partnership.”
Health officials say it’s a matter of life and death.
Eating too much salt can lead to hypertension, or high blood pressure, which is a major risk factor for heart disease, kidney failure and stroke. One in three U.S. adults — nearly 75 million people 20 or older — suffer from hypertension, and another 50 million adults suffer from pre-hypertension.
About 88 percent of the U.S population age 2 and older consumes more sodium each day than is recommended. On average, Americans ingest about 3,400 milligrams of sodium each day, or about 1.5 teaspoons of salt.
Experts have said they should consume no more than 2,300 milligrams, or 1 teaspoon a day.
People older than 50 should ingest even less.
However, lowering daily sodium intake even further, to 1,500 milligrams, would prevent more than 100,000 deaths a year and save billions in medical costs, said Jane Henney, a professor of medicine at the University of Cincinnati and the chair of the Institute of Medicine committee that authored the report.
The new recommendations would reduce sodium content and consumption incrementally without sacrificing flavor that consumers love.
If it’s done correctly over the course of several years, most people won’t even notice the change in their diets, Henney said.
Under the Institute of Medicine plan, acceptable sodium levels set by the FDA would vary by food groups such as meat, bread and grain; beverages; soup; and condiments.
Examples of salt levels
Sodium levels can be high in processed and packaged foods, and even higher in some restaurant meals. Some typical sodium levels collected from reports on company websites:
Red Lobster Admiral’s Feast (fried seafood): 4,400 mg; Olive Garden Chicken Parmigiana: 3,380 mg; Denny’s Moons Over My Hammy (scrambled egg sandwich with ham and cheese, hash browns): 2,580 mg; McDonald’s Double Quarter Pounder with cheese, ketchup, mustard and pickles: 1,380 mg; McDonald’s Happy Meal with Cheeseburger: 1,040 mg.
Campbell’s condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup: 870 mg per serving; Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, Family size: 580 mg per serving; Oscar Meyer Center Cut Bacon: 270 mg per serving; Nabisco Wheat Thins, original: 230 mg per serving.
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