Dealing with salt in our food

Dear Editor,

I would like to make comment on your article, The truth behind 5 common nutrition myths 31 August;

I agree more or less with the first two points of this article but I would like to highlight the third point about Sea Salt vs Table Salt.

This is an important one I believe for Samoa. And a simple inexpensive change that will significantly improve people health.

Salt gets a bad wrap. Salt is essential to life. But too much does causes a number of health issues.

The problem is that table salt is heated to extremely high temperatures which destroys the trace minerals and then it is coated in chemicals to stop it clumping, this is a lot of chemicals per serve as the surface area of a grain of salt is relatively large.

Salt harvested from areas of the ocean that are relatively less polluted than others are great but the main difference that the said article rubbishes is the trace minerals. 

The article says the trace minerals are in small amounts and we get these from other foods in our diet. Yes trace minerals are in small amounts but they have an important roll in helping you reach satiety (a feeling of fullness).

When your body tastes salt it checks the blood stream for trace minerals, when it finds enough it tells your brain you are full. When you eat table salt your body in the absence of trace minerals tells your body that you have not had enough and to keep eating. 

This is the reason why you can eat a whole bag of chips and not feel full, with each mouthful of processed salt your brain is told you have not had enough keep eating. 

As I said at the beginning, Salt is essential to life, and you will crave as much as YOU need, but watch out for the tricks of the food industry to get you eating more than you require.

If you want to lose weight, change your salt.

 

Callum Jones



Samoa Observer

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