23 Jun 2010 --- CASH (Consensus on Salt & Health) strongly endorses the expert guidance from NICE on salt reduction as it endorses and strengthens the current UK campaign being carried out by the FSA and CASH. Furthermore, it welcomes the reduction in the salt target from 6g a day to 3g a day by 2025 as this will prevent many thousands more deaths from stroke and heart disease.

CASH supports the urgent reduction in salt intake as a cost-effective government policy. The massive reduction in the number of people suffering from strokes and heart attacks would be reflected in huge financial savings to the NHS. Of all the policy recommendations salt is the easiest and most cost-effective to implement and will result in hundreds of millions of pounds of savings.

Graham Macgregor, Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine and Chairman of CASH comments: “These clear and important recommendations from NICE strengthen and endorse the current salt reduction campaign in the UK. It is essential that the new coalition government strongly backs these proposals and ensures that the UK food industry, already the world-leaders in salt reduction, continues to slowly reduce the amount of salt they’re adding into the foods we eat. This will result in hundreds of millions of pounds of savings because for every 1g reduction in salt intake, more than 12 000 strokes and heart attack events will be prevented. This is of even greater importance given the cost savings that must be made by the present government. ”