India has no national strategy for sodium reduction. (Photo: iStock)
A modelling study conducted by the World Health Organisation estimated that adherence to WHO-recommended sodium intake levels could prevent 300,000 deaths due to cardiovascular and chronic kidney disease over 10 years.
High levels of sodium – a component of salt – is one of the main dietary risks of death and disability. Packaged foods are a major source of sodium intake in high-income countries, and increasingly so in low- and middle-income countries.
However, researchers, including those from Hyderabad’s George Institute for Global Health, said India has no national strategy for sodium reduction, despite people consuming twice the recommended intake and increasing amounts of packaged foods.
The WHO recommends less than two grams of sodium per day, which is equivalent to about one teaspoon or five grams of salt per day.
The results, published in The Lancet Public Health journal, suggested substantial health benefits and cost savings within the first ten years of compliance, including preventing 1.7 million cardiovascular events, such as heart attacks and strokes, and seven million new chronic kidney disease cases, as well as savings of USD 800 million.
The authors said the modelling results make a strong case for India to mandate the implementation of WHO’s sodium benchmarks, especially when people are increasingly consuming packaged food.
Reducing sodium intake in the population by 30 per cent by 2025 is one of the nine global targets recommended by the WHO for the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases.
Countries including the UK, Argentina and South Africa have shown that setting targets regarding sodium content in packaged foods, as well as requiring food manufacturers to reformulate sodium to meet targets, can effectively reduce levels in packaged foods, and thereby reduce intake in the population, the authors said.
In India, there have been very few interventions to address the issue of high sodium intake, they said.
The current national initiative ‘Eat Right India’, launched in 2018 by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, aims to educate people about healthy eating, including reducing sodium intake, the researchers said. However, they said it is not known what impact adopting sodium targets for packaged foods could have on the country’s population.
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