- Declines in salt consumption in England have slowed since a 2011 shift in government policy gave greater freedom to the food industry to set and monitor targets for curbing salt intake, a new study suggests.
But after 2011,"the industry was not under the same amount of scrutiny and their efforts to reduce salt in foods seems to have waned," Laverty said by email. These extra cases of cardiovascular disease and cancer added up to 160 million British pounds in additional healthcare costs and lost productivity between 2011 and 2018, the researchers calculate. And if the current policy continues, the added health costs and lost productivity will exceed 1 billion pounds by 2025, they estimate.
Sodium is found not only in table salt, but in a variety of foods such as bread, milk, eggs, meat, and shellfish as well as processed items like pretzels, popcorn, soy sauce and bouillon or stock cubes.