Allright, so I try to lead a healthy lifestyle, you know get cardio in at least 3 times a week, drink lots of water, do the milk thing, and definitely no smoking, but what about salt? All of these studies in the past few years point to high salt intake (in more mature ages) causing greater risk of high blood pressure which can lead to complications in the kidney, and higher risk of heart attack and stroke. However, most studies show that there is not a significant realtionship, but that only individuals with genetic predispositions to all three of these conditions should closely monitor their salt intake.
The question comes in, why has the American Medical Association in 2004 say that salt intake for healthy 19-50 year olds should not exceed 3.8 grams. 3.8 grams, that's like 5 paper clips, I probably eat five paper clips worth of salt when I have a serving of a can of peas! I say this recommendation needs to be refigured just a little bit. First of all, we might deprive ourselves of certain foods because we won't eat them without that little bit of salt to pump up the flavor. So this is an example of offsetting behavior, in an effort to become more healthy, we actually become less healthy because of less nutrition.
In addition, there's all these reports that Americans love salt and we over consume salt, but I haven't seen anyone walking around with the thyroid disorder, goiter. Have you? This is because we have diets that provide enough of the trace nutrient iodine to prevent this disorder. Where do we get most of our iodine? You guessed it regualar iondinized table salt.
So I don't recommend putting a whole salt shakers worth of salt on your food claiming that it makes your carrots taste better or it's giving you more iodine, but I say not to fret if you're over your 5 paper clips worth of salt, because I think there's much more to worry about in our world today.
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You only live once.