Posted on 06/03/2012 7:37:05 PM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
THE first time I questioned the conventional wisdom on the nature of a healthy diet, I was in my salad days, almost 40 years ago, and the subject was salt. Researchers were claiming that salt supplementation was unnecessary after strenuous exercise, and this advice was being passed on by health reporters.
When I spent the better part of a year researching the state of the salt science back in 1998 — already a quarter century into the eat-less-salt recommendations — journal editors and public health administrators were still remarkably candid in their assessment of how flimsy the evidence was implicating salt as the cause of hypertension.
“You can say without any shadow of a doubt,” as I was told then by Drummond Rennie, an editor for The Journal of the American Medical Association, that the authorities pushing the eat-less-salt message had “made a commitment to salt education that goes way beyond the scientific facts.”
While, back then, the evidence merely failed to demonstrate that salt was harmful, the evidence from studies published over the past two years actually suggests that restricting how much salt we eat can increase our likelihood of dying prematurely. Put simply, the possibility has been raised that if we were to eat as little salt as the U.S.D.A. and the C.D.C. recommend, we’d be harming rather than helping ourselves.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The Silicon Dioxide is simply powdered sand. It won’t be absorbed by your gut.
Yes, one can survive; but would life truly be worth living under such conditions. I eat what ever I want, drink what ever I like; in sufficient quantities to satisfy my baser instincts and sooth my lustful desires for good food, good whiskey and good beer. I work my tail off in my fields about 12 to 14 hours a day this time of the year, and I am healthier than any of the hypersensitive, hypercarefull old farts that I know in my age group. Did I forget to mention I also like a good smoke every time I take a break.
What, on the "advice" of The New York Times? The ZPG, death-to-white-people guys? Think carefully about the source, and what they're telling you to do. Cui bono?
People on ACE inhibitors, or potassium-sparing diuretics (thiazides) for hypertension, can't do the potassium thing. No 'nanners, no "light salt" with sylvite (potassium chloride), those are counterindicated. At this point, I step aside in favor of the pharmacologist and the phlebotomist.
I’ll bet thats some salty urine. Sheesh
Read the book “Wheat Belly” for what some say is the real reason.
Indeed, I also believe they guess, albeit in an informed way much of the time.
After all they call it the “practice” of medicine and you know they do bury their mistakes.
Read an article about the banana awhile ago and if it was accurate it seems the fruit is truly a miricle food. It was difficult to believe all the benefits it provides.
So far I am blessed and never seem to get sick and take no medications at all. I have always eaten exactly what I want wihout limits and with no ill effects.
I stopped paying attention to drs when in the mid 80’s a Dr told me if I didn't lower my cholesterol I would be dead in 10 years. He said no more cheese, butter, eggs, bacon, etc. IOW nothing that tastes good. I couldn't even get him to agree a slice of pepperoni pizza once a week would be OK.
Bottom line? I tossed is menu in the trash on the way out the door of the office building he was in and 35 yrs later, as I said no health issues and I feel greeat.
I do walk about 3 miles daily so probably that has something to do with it and my weight is reasonable at about 180 lbs on my 6’ 2” frame.
Like someone here said, all things in moderation (except Szechuan and Pizza)
Maybe because they’ve been convinced Sea Salt is healthier than Plain Old Salt
Stop and think........where did plain old salt come from????????
Hint: The ancient seas!
Salt is either mined or by way of evaporation pools.
>>it is a scientific numbers game. <<
So is global warming.
It’s not just you.
At 23, doctors think Lizzie Velasquez has a form of the rare neonatal progeroid syndrome, which accelerates her aging and makes it almost impossible to gain weight. Blind in one eye, indeed, she does have to eat between 5,000 and 8,000 calories a day, and has never been more than 62 pounds, according to reports.
People survived Death Camps because they were able to survive on minimal calories. That’s it plain and simple.
Sushi is on the menu for friday this week.
My oldest daughter really likes Inari so she’ll have to add iodized salt.
Thanks for the post!
The obesity epidemic;
Here is a monkey wrench into the idea of eating too much. Estrogen levels have been increasing in everything, ground water, wells and municipal water systems, and in the soil where it ends up in the vegetables grown in backyard gardens.
Testosterone levels have been decreasing not just in men but also in woman and yes woman naturally have a low level of testosterone.
With estrogen up and testosterone down could this be why we all are putting on weight?
>I’ve seen patients take steroids and gain weight without reduction in activity or increase in calories.
Well, of course they do. - a problem was that the AMA - and doctors in general - said for many years that steroids do no such thing & warnings were placed on the package literature to that effect.
Lay people knew better & ignored the warnings to get the benefits even though perhaps they should not have.
Little has changed.
I am aware that there are more steroids than anabolics used in medicine & that unintended weight gain is a side effect.
Thank you for your post.
Every doctor I've seen over the years the last thing they tell before you leave the office
" Now if this doesn't help you come back and we'll try something else"
This is good news for me as a shameless, unrepentant Salt-a-holic. I never saw a salty food I didn’t like. Crackers. Corn chips. Peanuts. Soy sauce. Don’t even get me near french fries. I am a crack ho for salt.
Beyond that, I’ll take this article with a grain of salt. The researchers constantly change their minds. They said eggs would kill you, now they are good for you. They said potatoes would kill you, now you can live on them. Cheese has been demonized, then praised. Nuts were bad for you, now they are super foods.
I’m a diehard Salt-a-holic in my 50s, having consumed a lake bed of salt. My blood pressure is dead center and better than many friends who avoid salt like the plague. What does that tell you?
A lot of this “science” is just guesswork and hooey.
On a salt related note:
I had a boss that was a friend but loved to rag on me in front of the crew.
We were at a bar for St. Patrick’s day and the tightwad shocked me by actually buying me a beer. It came and I set aside my warm half-beer and started in on the fresh cold one.
People started screwing with my warm beer putting in pepper and ketchup and whatnot.
My boss went to rag on me and called me out saying “I’ll give you $20 if you drink it”. I said, “throw in some mustard and salt too, because no way I’m drinking that crap.”
He raised the ante to $40.
Now my boss was a tightwad so flipped the tables and offered him $100 to drink it. He refused but I could see the wheels spinning in his greedy evil brain, so I blured out “$200 to drink it. Come on. Make an easy $200.
People differ on if I got my $200 worth. Some say I was crazy to waste such money. But I had a 10 year history with this guy who was a co-worker and became a boss, and he always had a whipping boy to tease before the crew, thinking it was good for morale to be jocular. He usually had someone weaker than me to single out, but whenever people came and went, I was his default doormat and I was sick of the practice. He was generally a good guy and really took care of his people, but I couldn’t stand the constant teasing and I wanted to do something to put him in his place.
So being greedy, he caved and accepted the offer of $200 to drink a warm beer saturated with ketchup, mustard, pepper, salt, sugar. I mean, it was vile. Rancid. Serving this stuff to a POW would violate the Geneva convention.
So he stirred it and slammed it and declared victory and I told him he would get my $200 first thing at work. Part of the “bet” was that he had to keep it down for 5 minutes, and at 5:01.01, he flat bolted for the bathroom. I can’t say which way it came out as I wasn’t there, but I will say that was the last I saw of him that night.
Now to the salt part. The bad part.
Salt, potassium primarily, regulates heartbeat. I had no clue that saturating your system with NaCl salt can kill you. No, I didn’t kill my friend/boss, but he was sick as a dog all night, running to the bathroom frequently, extremely elevated heart-rate, panting, and couldn’t sleep all night.
I did what I did to turn the tables on a boss who didn’t realize that he teased his underlings to the point of harassment. I did it to humiliate him for a change, and for the most part it worked. Most co-workers thought I was nuts to pay $200 to “show him up” until I brought in a sample of what I paid him to drink and made them the same offer. NOBODY took me up on it and they got the point.
The bottom line is, for all I know, my boss may have come close to death that night. I had no clue that enormous salt intake can kill you. Now I know and it makes sense. Too much water and there is not enough salt in your dilute system to regulate your heartbeat. Same for too much, and either can kill you.
Here is betting he never takes any one else up on an offer to drink a vile concoction for mere money again.
We had a poker group that was heavily Hispanic and one of the guys wives was a fabulous cook who gave us Mexican culinary heaven whenever he hosted poker. It was at one such game I was introduced to the glories of Jalapeno dip.
I dove in with reckless abandon and one of the guys said, “You love that stuff, huh? Enjoy it now. You will be paying later.”
I thought, yeah big deal. How bad can it be, and I just emptied that bowl of dip.
Later... Ooooooooooooooooooooooooh. Ouch. Yowza. God help me. Eyes watering hail mary’s on the pot. Random pleas of repentance if granted survival.
Man, that was an experience. Once again, that would be grounds for war crimes trials if you served that stuff in that quantity at Guantanamo. I learned a hard lesson. Make that a hot lesson. I don’t even know what it did to my internal organs. Either I’ll get cancer 10 years sooner, or it killed off every cancer cell in my body. I don’t know which. If mine is a well preserved corpse, I’m just going to assume the reason is that Jalapeno dip binge back in 1989.
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