Salt and stomach cancer — one more reason to hold the salt

Salt is one of my food enemies, contributing to my high blood pressure and subsequent heart issues that led to my angioplasty in 2012.

I have worked mightily to get salt out of my diet by completely reinventing how I shop in supermarkets and other food stores and by carefully analyzing restaurant menus before eating out.

Recently, I came across another good reason to get the salt out of your diet, this article from India linking salt to stomach cancer.

“Salt and salty foods are classified by the World Cancer Research Fund/American Institute for Cancer Research (WCRF/AICR) as a probable cause of stomach cancer,” the article notes, adding that increased salt consumption is leading to higher incidences of stomach cancer in India.

“Of late, we are seeing a lot of young patients suffering from an aggressive form of gastric cancers. This was not the case earlier. Change in the lifestyle is one of the reasons for these cancers striking the young early,” one doctor says in the piece.

As if high blood pressure and heart disease are enough reasons to cut the salt. If the thought of taking blood pressure medication the rest of your life won’t get you off salt, how about the thought of fighting stomach cancer?

John