Evidence suggests that sodium chloride is not responsible for the hypertension epidemic in developed nations. Studies investigating the effects of salt have found that while a small sub-population of individuals may be affected negatively by salt, normal healthy individuals can excrete excess salt without deleterious blood pressure changes. Further, studies show that those sensitive to salt may include individuals who had premature births. Other factors therefore must explain the high rates of hypertension, and it is therefore interesting as to why the mainstream medical establishment and media have spent decades trying to promote low salt diets. In fact the nutritional literature shows consistently that low quality diets containing refined foods are the cause of Western lifestyle diseases such as hypertension. This is likely because such diets lack essential nutrients required for proper metabolic function, which results in a gradual deterioration of normal physiology toward the pathological state.
The association between various essential nutrients and Western lifestyle disease has been extensively studied in the nutritional literature. For example, as part of the Honolulu Heart study1 Japanese men in Hawaii, free from cardiovascular disease, had their dietary intakes recorded. The researchers then used univariate and multivariate analysis (analysis of single and multiple variables, respectively) to find nutritional associations with blood pressure. Both magnesium and calcium intake were significantly inversely associated with systolic and diastolic blood pressure, supporting findings from other similar studies as well as results from clinical trials. Phosphorus and potassium intakes were also inversely associated with blood pressure, as too was vitamin C. A dose response inverse association across quintiles was found between vegetable protein and blood pressure. Fibre too showed an inverse association with blood pressure, with a sharp decrease between the 4th and 3rd quartile of intakes.
The common feature of many of the above nutrients is that they are present in whole fresh fruit, vegetables and whole grain cereals. Plant foods are known to be protective of disease because they contain high levels of micronutrients and bioavailable phytonutrient antioxidants, as well as high fibre to starch ratios. That starch intake correlated inversely with blood pressure is evidence of this, particularly as the pattern was similar to that of vegetable protein. The nutrient with the strongest association with blood pressure was magnesium, which supports findings from other studies. Magnesium is particularly beneficial because it causes relaxation of smooth muscle in arteries due to its ability to antagonise calcium, the latter being involved in the contraction of muscle. Western diets contain refined grains and are devoid of green leafy vegetables which gives them a low concentrations of magnesium, and this may contribute to the high rates of hypertension in developed nation.
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