To legislate or not to legislate? The need for legislative policies in food reformulation
During this year’s International Society of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity conference a symposium was conducted on the use of legislation to aid reformulation and create healthier food environments. A/Prof Jacqui Webster chaired the symposium which included three presentations, the first by Clare Farrand from The George Institute (TGI) on a rapid review of sugar […]
Dietary Sources of Salt in Low- and Middle-Income Countries
Menyanu E et al recently published a systematic literature review, investigating the dietary sources of salt in low- and middle- income countries (LMICs), published in Environmental Research and Public Health. They reviewed articles that included information on dietary intake of salt using dietary assessment methods, food composition tables, and/or laboratory analysis of the salt content […]
Staff Profile: Dejen Tekle
Dejen Tekle is a PhD student and research fellow at The George Institute for Global Health. He works for the Public Health Advocacy and Policy Impact team in supporting salt reduction research and advocacy activities, in Africa and globally. Dejen commenced his PhD at the University of New South Wales, faculty of Medicine in February […]
‘Low-Salt’ Bread as an Important Component of a Pragmatic Reduced-Salt Diet for Lowering Blood Pressure in Adults with Elevated Blood Pressure
A 5 week food-based randomised crossover trial by Cashman K et al assessed the effect of including ‘low salt’ bread as part of a reduced-salt diet on blood pressure, markers of bone metabolism and plasma lipids in adults with elevated blood pressure in Ireland. 97 participants were randomly assigned to either the reduced-salt diet or […]
The Healthfulness of the US Packaged Food and Beverage Supply: A Cross-Sectional Study
Baldridge A et al conducted a cross-sectional analysis of US packaged food and beverage supply in 2018 using data from Label Insight’s Open Data, which represents over 80% of the all products over the past 3 years. Nutrition data from over 230,000 products was obtained and healthfulness was assessed by Health Star Rating (HSR) and […]
Trends in Blood Pressure and Usual Dietary Sodium Intake Among Children and Adolescents
Overwyk K et al investigated temporal trends and secular changes in blood pressure in 12,249 individuals aged 8 to 17 years, who participated in the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, from 2003 to 2016. Sodium intake was estimated from dietary data, and logistic regression was used to investigate secular trends and the associations […]
The Science of Salt: A global review on changes in sodium levels in foods
A global review by Santos JA et al in the Journal of Clinical Hypertension summarised and synthesised the evidence for changes in sodium levels in food products. The review included studies from 2013 to 2018 that were published in the Science of Salt Weekly newsletter, which are identified through a weekly MEDLINE search. 24 relevant […]
Effects of urinary sodium-to-potassium ratio change on blood pressure
Pereira T et al recently published results from the ELSA-Brazil longitudinal health study, investigating the effect of urinary sodium-to-potassium (Na/K) ratio on blood pressure (BP). 14,014 participants completed baseline measurements and, four years later, follow-up measurements. Overnight (12-hour) urine samples were collected and validated equations were used to translate these measures into 24-hour sodium and […]
Sodium and Potassium Intake Assessed by Spot and 24-h Urine in the Population-Based Tromsø Study 2015–2016
Meyer H et al investigated the validity of spot urine measures in the Norwegian based Tromsø study. They collected 24-hour urine and spot urine samples from 475 men and women who participated in the population-based study between 2015 and 2016, comparing 24-hour urine measures with spot-urine using three different equations (INTERSALT (with potassium), Toft and […]
Monitoring Sodium Content in Processed Foods in Argentina 2017-2018: Compliance with National Legislation and Regional Targets
Published in Nutrients in June, Allemandi L et al reported on an evaluation of compliance of Argentinean processed foods with national and regional sodium targets. Data were collected on 3674 food products from four stores between August 2017 and May 2018. 864 products could be compared to the Argentinean sodium targets, which were set under […]