NY takes on salty foods

NEW YORK | First, it was a ban on artery-clogging trans fats. Then calories were by law posted on menus. Now the New York City health department is taking on salt.

City officials are meeting with food makers and restaurants to discuss reducing the amount of salt in common foods such as soup, pasta sauce, salad dressing and bread.

About three-quarters of the salt Americans eat comes from prepared and processed food, not from the salt shaker. That’s why New York officials want the food industry to help cut back.

“It’s very hard for an individual to do this on their own,” said Dr. Lynn Silver, an assistant commissioner in the city health department.

The department has shown its clout with bans on artificial trans fats and rules forcing chain restaurants to post calorie counts. To comply, fast food chains changed their recipes nationwide, and other cities and states have enacted similar policies.

Some manufacturers said getting rid of trans fats took work, and reducing salt has its own difficulties.

Unlike sugar, there’s no substitute for salt. Cream soups - like that casserole favorite cream of mushroom - are the biggest challenge, said George Dowdie, head of research and development for Campbell Soup Co. The soup maker, which has been cutting salt for years, is in the talks with New York.

By fall, Campbell Soup plans to have more than 90 lower-sodium soups available. That includes its first soup, tomato, which will have almost a third less salt.

The industry hopes salt reduction remains voluntary.

“Literally freight cars full of salt have been removed from these products gradually over time,” said Robert Earl, vice president of science policy, nutrition and health for the Grocery Manufacturers Association. “It has to be done carefully - gradually and incremental over time.”

Herbert Smith Jr. never paid much attention to how much salt was in food until he developed high blood pressure. His doctor at a Harlem health center put him on medication and told him to exercise and watch his diet.

The 54-year-old church receptionist said he was alarmed to see how much salt was in the instant soup packages that he liked. He wants the food industry to cut down. “For those who want to use salt, they can add it themselves,” he said.

Too much salt raises blood pressure, and high blood pressure raises the risk of heart disease. A recent analysis showed that for every gram of salt cut, as many as 250,000 cases of heart disease and 200,000 deaths could be prevented over a decade.

“Very, very small changes in diet could have dramatic effects,” said Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, a researcher with the University of California at San Francisco.

For its salt initiative, New York has recruited public health agencies and medical groups across the country. The campaign, with a goal of cutting salt intake by at least 20 percent in five years, is modeled on a plan carried out in Britain. That effort set voluntary salt reduction targets for 85 categories of processed foods.

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