Eating too much salt at once, whether in one meal or during the day, can have some short and long-term consequences.
By:
Agencies
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Salt is made up of about 40% sodium and 60% chloride. It is commonly used to add flavor to or preserve foods.
Sodium is an essential mineral for optimal muscle and nerve function. Along with chloride, it also helps your body maintain a proper balance of water and minerals; however, despite its essential functions, eating too much salt can have unpleasant effects, both in the short and long term.
Next, we tell you what happens in your body if you eat too much:
Short-term effects of eating too much salt
Eating too much salt at once, whether in one meal or over a day, can have some short-term consequences. Some are:
Water retention
First, you may notice that you feel more bloated than normal. This happens because your kidneys want to maintain a specific sodium / water ratio in your body. To do this, they retain extra water to make up for the extra sodium they ate.
This increased water retention can cause swelling, especially in the hands and feet, and can make you weigh more than usual.
Increased blood pressure
A meal rich in salt can also cause increased blood volume to flow through the blood vessels and arteries. This can cause a temporary increase in blood pressure.
That being said, not everyone can experience these effects. For example, research suggests that people who are resistant to salt may not experience a rise in blood pressure after high-salt meals.
A person’s sensitivity to salt is believed to be influenced by factors such as genetics and hormones. Aging and obesity can also amplify the effects of high salt diets that increase blood pressure.
These variables may explain why salt-rich diets do not automatically result in an increase in blood pressure for everyone.
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Eating a salty meal can also make you dry or thirsty. Encouraging her to drink is another way her body tries to correct the sodium-water ratio.
The resulting increase in fluid intake may cause you to urinate more than normal. On the other hand, not consuming fluids after eating large amounts of salt can cause your body’s sodium levels to rise above a safe level, resulting in a condition known as hypernatremia.
Hypernatremia can cause water to leak out of cells and into the blood in an attempt to dilute excess sodium. If left untreated, this fluid change can lead to confusion, seizures, coma, and even death.
Other symptoms of hypernatremia include restlessness, difficulty breathing and sleeping, and decreased urination.
Long-term effects of eating too much salt
Eating too much salt over a long period of time can lead to various health problems, such as:
Raise blood pressure.
Research suggests that high-salt diets significantly increase blood pressure and that lowering the salt content of a person’s diet may help lower their blood pressure levels.
For example, two large reviews report that a reduction in salt intake of 4.4 grams per day can decrease systolic and diastolic blood pressure (the upper and lower numbers in one reading) by up to 4.18 mm Hg and 2.06 mm Hg respectively.
However, the observed reductions were almost twice as high in individuals with high blood pressure, compared to those with blood pressure in the normal range.
May increase the risk of stomach cancer
Several studies link a high-salt diet to an increased risk of stomach cancer. A review that includes more than 268,000 participants suggests that those with an average salt intake of 3 grams per day may have up to a 68% higher risk of stomach cancer than those with an average salt intake of 1 gram per day.
Other research also hints that people with high intakes of salt may be at twice the risk of stomach cancer than those with lower intakes. Still, this study does not clearly define what is considered high or low salt intake.
The mechanism behind the effect of salt on stomach cancer is not fully understood, but experts believe that high-salt diets can make a person more vulnerable to stomach cancer by causing ulcers or inflammation of the stomach lining.
Effect on the risks of heart disease and premature death
The link between salt-rich diets, heart disease, and premature death remain somewhat controversial.
Some studies suggest that high salt intake causes an increase in blood pressure and a hardening of the blood vessels and arteries. These changes, in turn, can lead to an increased risk of heart disease and premature death.
For example, a 20-year study found that participants who consumed less than 5.8 grams of salt per day had the lowest mortality rates, while those who consumed more than 15 grams of salt per day had the highest.
In contrast, others report that high-salt diets have no effect on heart health or longevity, and that low-salt diets can increase the risk of heart disease and death.
These different study results can be explained by the differences in study design, the methods used to estimate sodium intake, and the factors of the participants, such as weight, sensitivity to salt, and the other health problems that the participants can face.
While eating too much salt may not increase the risk of heart disease or premature death for everyone, more experimentation is needed before firm conclusions can be drawn.
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