The Salt Fix
What if everything you know about salt is wrong? A leading cardiovascular research scientist explains how this vital crystal got a negative reputation, and shows how to lower blood pressure and experience weight loss using salt. The Salt Fix is essential reading for everyone on the keto diet! We’ve all heard the recommendation: eat no more than a teaspoon of salt a day for a healthy heart. Health-conscious Americans have hewn to the conventional wisdom that your salt shaker can put you on the fast track to a heart attack, and have suffered through bland but “heart-healthy” dinners as a result. What if the low-salt dogma is wrong? Dr. James DiNicolantonio has reviewed more than five hundred publications to unravel the impact of salt on blood pressure and heart disease. He’s reached a startling conclusion: The vast majority of us don’t need to watch our salt intake. In fact, for most of us, more salt would be advantageous to our nutrition—especially for those of us on the keto diet, as keto depletes this important mineral from our bodies. The Salt Fix tells the remarkable story of how salt became unfairly demonized—a never-before-told drama of competing egos and interests—and took the fall for another white crystal: sugar.
Stats for nerds
5recommend
9mentions
6people
2018–2022years
56% recommend44% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- You have missed the point. Scientists were the ones making it black and white. The consensus was the sun was bad for your health. They said stay out of the sun and supplement with vitamin D. As for salt, scientists got that wrong as well. Read The Salt Fix [1] for more on that.
[1] https://www.amazon.ca/Salt-Fix-Experts-Wrong-Eating-ebook/dp...
- I'm also on the fence about how salt is 'unhealthy'. Read the book The Salt Fix by Dr. James DiNicolantonio
- Across populations the average salt intake is around 3.7 grams of sodium per day.
Sodium intake is actually regulated by the body, just like protein. Your body demands more salt when it needs it. Which means that around 3.7 grams might actually be the optimal amount of sodium intake.
There are many studies showing that the standard recommendation for reducing the salt intake is bullshit. Not only that, but reduced salt intake is linked to obesity and sugar cravings.
Also before refrigerators, like in the 19th century, people consumed a lot more sodium because salt was the primary way to preserve food, especially meat. All modern chronic diseases were rare back then ... and yes, heart disease was harder to diagnose, but improvements in technology can't explain it fully, plus we are also talking of diabetes and cancer.
For skeptics, I recommend reading "The Salt Fix" which provides a good overview of the history and of various studies: http://thesaltfix.com/
---
I'm not saying that healthcare professionals are idiots.
The problem is that healthcare is reductionist. Studies that properly use the scientific method don't lie, but the problem is that people often reach the wrong conclusions.
It's like in that fable in which a group of blind people are told to feel and describe an elephant, only in real life some of the blind people have more political clout than others.
- Recommend people read the book The Salt Fix, by Dr. James DiNicolantonio. Just like cholesterol and Ancel Keyes, opinions of just a handful of people, in particular Dr. Walter Kempner, changed public health policy against salt with very little evidence to back it all up. Now you are starting to see all this terrible advice unravel.
- We have long vilified the wrong white crystal substance for increases in blood pressure.
Good reading on the matter is The Salt Fix.
- The Salt Fix outlines how restricting sodium intake causes kidney issues and disturbs insulin response. It is causing iodine deficiency as well, which leads to thyroid problems. The author suggests HFCS and white sugar caused the obesity epidemic along with the associated health problems. This has been suppressed for decades by the industry. The Mediterranean diet is only a basic hypothesis.
