Hello, I'm Monica Reinagle and you are listening to the Nutrition Diva Podcast. Welcome.

The recommended maximum intake for sodium is about 2,300 milligrams a day and that's roughly

one teaspoon of table salt. Most Americans eat about 3,400 milligrams per day and you

know what, that upsets the people whose job it is to worry about your health. And I'm

not just talking about your mother and me, there are whole government agencies that lay

awake at night worrying about your sodium intake. Their main concern is that eating a lot

of salt can raise your blood pressure and that can be quite dangerous. Now a high sodium

diet doesn't lead to high blood pressure in everyone and some people have high blood

pressure even when they eat a very low sodium diet. But public health policy is all about

playing the numbers. The government figures that if everyone ate less salt, fewer people

would develop high blood pressure, have strokes, and die and that would be a good thing.

Accordingly, they have spent the last several decades nagging consumers to reduce their

sodium intake and they've also been pestering food manufacturers to reduce the amount

of sodium in processed and packaged foods. Now, I don't want to be hasty and jump to

any premature conclusions but the first 50 years of this effort don't appear to have produced

a whole lot of progress. To be sure, you do see a lot more reduced sodium or no salt added

options at the grocery store. Unfortunately, consumers apparently don't find reduced sodium

products very enjoyable. Reducing the salt in canned vegetables or canned beans does more

than just change the taste. It can also negatively affect the texture and the aroma of foods and

even shorten their shelf life. For this and many other reasons, all but the most diligent

and vigilant of consumers continue to exceed sodium recommendations by a wide margin.

So what's the solution? When I'm coaching people on health habits or weight management,

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