Cutting back on salt in your diet lowers your blood pressure—on average, by about 4 points for the top number and 2 points for the bottom number.

73

Pro

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Against

Evidence from Studies

Supporting (1)

73

Community contributions welcome

73

Effect of dose and duration of reduction in dietary sodium on blood pressure levels: systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised trials

Systematic Review With Meta-Analysis

Human

2020 Feb 24

This big study looked at many experiments and found that when people eat less salt, their blood pressure goes down — exactly as the claim says. It even found the same numbers: cutting salt by 130 mmol lowers systolic pressure by 4.26 mm Hg and diastolic by 2.07 mm Hg.

Contradicting (0)

0

Community contributions welcome

No contradicting evidence found

Gold Standard Evidence Needed

According to GRADE and EBM methodology, here is what ideal scientific evidence would look like to definitively prove or disprove this specific claim, ordered from strongest to weakest evidence.

Source Study

Effect of dose and duration of reduction in dietary sodium on blood pressure levels: systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised trials

Score: 73

DOI: 10.1136/bmj.m315

Similar Assertions

Cutting back on salt for just one week lowers blood pressure by about 8 points in most people over 50, even if they’re already taking blood pressure medicine — and it works just as well whether they have high blood pressure or not.

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If you eat much less salt, your blood pressure will go down—lower salt means lower blood pressure, and the less salt you eat, the more your pressure drops, with no point where cutting more salt stops helping.

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If you cut down how much salt you eat from a lot to very little, your blood pressure will go down—by about 15 points for the top number and 10 points for the bottom number—and this works best if you already have high blood pressure.

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90%

If you eat less salt—about 2.3 grams less per day—your blood pressure will likely go down by about 5.6 points for the top number and 2.3 points for the bottom number, no matter if you're already taking blood pressure medicine.

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90%

If you have high blood pressure and eat less salt—cutting from about 4.6 grams down to 1.5–2.4 grams a day—your blood pressure will likely go down a bit, especially if you're older, Black, or have kidney disease or metabolic syndrome.

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