Low-sodium diet ‘may not help to lower blood pressure’

Reducing a person's sodium intake may not be as effective a means of reducing blood pressure as previously thought.

This is according to a new study from Boston University, which followed more than 2,600 men and women for 16 years and showed that consuming less sodium was not associated with lower blood pressure.

Indeed, participants who consumed less than 2,500 mg of sodium a day actually had higher blood pressure than participants who consumed higher amounts of sodium, adding credence to recent observations indicating that excessively high and excessively low sodium levels are both associated with a higher risk of heart disease.

Lynn Moore, associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine, said: "We saw no evidence that a diet lower in sodium had any long-term beneficial effects on blood pressure. Our findings add to growing evidence that current recommendations for sodium intake may be misguided."

The study also indicated that higher intakes of potassium, calcium and magnesium were linked with lower blood pressure over the long term, with those with a higher combined intake of sodium and potassium having the lowest blood pressure.

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