Don’t Be So Salty

Super Bowl Sunday has something for everyone – funny commercials, a delicious spread of snacks, a rocking halftime show and, of course, there’s football. But even if the team you’re rooting for takes an “L” today, that’s no reason to get salty.

Studies show Americans eat more than one billion wings over Super Bowl weekend and as many as 2,400 calories during the game, including chips, hot dogs and other foods packed with sodium. While you might argue that game day food is a “once in a while thing,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 90% of Americans consume too much salt on a regular basis.

Part of the problem is that most of our daily salt intake comes from packaged, processed and restaurant food. So, you might not even notice how much sodium you’re consuming.

Diets high in salt also happen to be a leading cause of high blood pressure. Salt causes your body to retain water, which puts pressure on blood vessel walls and raises your blood pressure.

If you cut down on the amount of salt you eat, you can lower your blood pressure. One way to do this is to read food labels. A 5% or less daily value percentage of sodium is low, while 20% or more is high.

In a 2022 study, researchers found that people who always salt their food had a 28% increased risk of dying prematurely compared to those who never or rarely added sodium to their meals.

So, shake off the habit—and don’t be so salty!

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