Context:
The World Health Organization (WHO) has issued new guidelines recommending the replacement of regular table salt with lower sodium salt substitutes to reduce sodium intake and improve cardiovascular health.
Key Recommendations:
- Salt Reduction
- Target Adults should consume less than 2 grams of sodium per day.
- Substitutions
- Use normal sodium chloride (NaCl), while replacing household portions partly with potassium chloride (KCl).
- Exclusions
- Avoid application for pregnant ladies, children and individuals who suffer kidney failures or illnesses causing abnormal loss of potassium.
- Processed Food Applications
- Not an application to manufactured food, not applicable in food packets and food that is consumed from hotels or restaurants.
Health Effectiveness of Reducing Sodium
- Overconsumption
- Overconsumption of sodium results in hypertension, thereby increasing the chances of getting heart diseases, strokes and kidney disease. 19 million deaths per year are due to high sodium consumption.
- Lowering sodium intake can help avert noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) including cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and gastric cancer.
- Oversalt Food in India
- People in India oversalt their food. There should be for making low sodium salt available and affordable to the masses, so that at the population level there will be a change of behavior.
Normal Sodium Chloride (NaCl) vs Potassium Chloride (KCl)
Sodium chloride and potassium chloride are salts, differing in usage as well as the characteristics of them.
- Properties Structure
- Sodium chloride is a crystal, while potassium chloride is an ionic solid.
- Electronegativity
- Potassium chloride has a higher electronegativity than sodium chloride. Cost: Sodium chloride is generally cheaper than potassium chloride.
Uses
- Water softening
- Both salts are used in water softeners to replace hard water minerals.
- Electrolyte replenisher
- Both salts are used to replenish electrolytes. Food processing: Potassium chloride is used as a substitute for sodium chloride in salted meat products.
- Healthcare
- Potassium chloride is used to treat hypokalemia.
- Fire extinguisher
- Potassium chloride was once used as a fire extinguishing agent. Optical crystal: Potassium chloride is used as an optical crystal.
- Optical crystal
- Potassium chloride is used as an optical crystal.
Health
- Sodium: Consuming too much sodium can increase blood pressure.
- Potassium: Increasing potassium intake can help decrease blood pressure.
