Salt: A Hazardous Food Condiment or a Beneficial Nutritional Supplement?

Some of you might have heard a lot of things regarding your health and the consumption of salt. You probably read about which salt is potentially good for you and with one is bad. You might even know the connection between salt and cancer. In this post I’ll go beyond those concepts to expose facts about salt that will help you make decisions about its use, whether you have cancer or not.

The role of salt in human nutrition has always been controversial. Some people regard salt as a relatively safe condiment, harmless in small quantities. Some view it as indispensable for sodium/potassium balance, claiming there should be a minimum requirement of salt in our diet. Some view it as a serious health offender, causing a multitude of problems. There are many views on how much salt, which kind, and what are the human requirements. There are many accounts of people giving up salt for long periods of time and then becoming sick when reintroduced to it, with symptoms of nausea and diarrhea. There are also theories linking the intake of salt with the increase of hydrochloric acid in our stomachs. With less salt, less production of hydrochloric acid, and that means a weaker digestion. The information about salt seems to be inconclusive, controversial, and isolated.

The first time I came across a no-salt diet was when I read about it in Max Gerson’s A Cancer Therapy. I saw Charlotte Gerson, his granddaughter, talk at the Cancer Control Society Convention back in 2005. She mentioned how salt actually destroys tissue. In fact, the Gerson diet prohibits ALL forms of salt including table salt, sea salt, celery salt, vegetable salt, Bragg Liquid Aminos, tamari, soy sauce, “lite salt”, even baking soda and Epson salt contact. ANYTHING with the word “sodium” in it.

Gerson noticed that patients with chronic degenerative illnesses, including cancer, exhibited a decrease in potassium, mainly because of an unbalanced intake of sodium. Sodium and potassium have antagonistic effects. Sodium produces edema (water retention) and that causes a myriad of problems at the cellular level: loss of electricity, enzyme formation problems, and reduced cell oxidation, among others, all symptoms of Tissue Damage Syndrome, or TDS. He believed that at the core of every degenerative disease there was a sodium culprit.

Max Gerson was clear in saying that just eliminating salt from our diets doesn’t eliminate cancer immediately. But he did say that removing salt brings about changes at a cellular level that cancerous cells can’t adapt to, causing their death. The fact that edema and irritation decrease, the fact that mineral balance is corrected, and that enzyme production is restored, causes an increase in the metabolic rate of all cells, including cancer cells. Since cancer cells can only ferment, such metabolic change contributes to their death. That’s why in his cancer regimen it becomes so important to avoid sodium at all costs.

The second time I came across a no-salt diet was when I started reading about calorie restriction diets, which I absolutely believe are extremely important to fight and prevent cancer. I read Joel Fuhrman book Eat to Live, a book that changed my life. His is a calorie restricted diet that also requires no salt added to the food. He says that salt is linked not only to hypertension but also to stomach cancer (maybe because of too much acid?). He also says that salt pulls calcium and other trace minerals from your body that are excreted through the urine, causing osteoporosis in the long run.  He says that salt increases platelet clogging in our blood. Salt has harmful effects, in his view, and he doesn’t differentiate between table salt or sea salt. He does say that if you consume it, you should add it to your food before eating. Taste becomes saltier this way than when you add it while cooking, a way to reduce its consumption, I guess.

My third showdown with salt was with an article on the July issue of the Townsend Letter by Vivienne Bradshaw-Black which claims that only unrefined salt should be consumed and that in fact this type of salt is essential for water utilization in every cell. She says that when overly refined salt, which she considers unfit for human consumption, is ingested the sodium stays inside the cell causing all sorts of problems, which coincides with the views of Gerson and Fhurman. But she says that when the sodium chloride is perfectly balanced with other minerals at a harmonic ratio, as in unrefined raw sea salt, the sodium leaves the tissues after its work is done, contributing to cellular fluidity. She also says something interesting. If the salt is heated it looses its nutritional properties and becomes unfit for consumption. So she recommends adding it only after cooking. Same recommendation as Fuhrman but for a different reason. It makes me wonder if cooked sea salt actually looses its flavor, which it does, because of the heat.

Vivienne advocates for a right-salt diet instead of a no salt one. she considers lack of water and lack of unrefined salt the main factors of poor nutrition. She says that 25% of the salt in our bodies is stored in our bones as crystals, which strengthen their structure. She comes to say no salt=no life, bringing up an example involving water and refined salt at the same concentration as sea water. Organisms in the refined salt solution died even though they lived not only in their natural sea water, but even in distilled water. That proves that refined salt is actually toxic to our organs, says Vivienne.

So, how should life be after Gerson, Fuhrman, Vivienne, and others? They are probably all correct in their findings. What should we do? I definitely believe that salt fasting has great benefits, and I also agree that unrefined sun dried sea salt in small quantities doesn’t cause the same effects as table salt in terms of dehydration and edema. If you have cancer, you might as well be as far away from sodium as possible. At least for as long as your condition remains uncertain. However, you may want to check with a holistic doctor regarding your specific condition.

Gerson simplified the effects of salt in your body with a great visual example. Have you ever had a backup in your home sewage system? Have you felt the panic when whatever stoppage in your house pipes caused your sewage not to run? Have you flushed your toilet in hopes it drains just to discover that the dirty water overflows? Well, that’s probably the best way to illustrate how sodium affects your cells. And don’t think that it is as easy as throwing out the salt shaker. Our processed food is overloaded with sodium. It is more than our bodies can handle.

You should know that vegetarian diets contain much more organic sodium than meat based diets, although because it is also a diet high in potassium, more salt is released from the body through the urine.The ration of sodium/potassium in an apple, for example, is 1 to 100. Couldn’t it be the case that this mineral ration actually improves cellular fluidity? Couldn’t it be a more balanced way to stabilized the combination of both minerals within your body?

Personally, I add a pinch of raw sea salt to my distilled water to make it minerally balanced. Removing all salt unfit for human consumption is something every holistic voice agrees upon, and It’s something any cancer diet should have. The amount of sea salt you should take for mineral nutrition is relatively small anyways. Much much smaller than you are probably taking right now.

My Personal General recommendations:

• Raw unrefined sea salt is nutritionally rich, but you should treat it as a supplement, not as a condiment.
• Find out if you have a mineral unbalance, use unrefined raw salt to correct it. Otherwise avoid salt altogether.
• There are other sources of sodium in our diets other than salt. Don’t believe that salt is the only way to get this mineral. A professional athlete might loose 500 mg of sodium in a day of grueling training. 1/4 tsp of ordinary salt has almost 600mg. Most people consume more than 2 teaspoons of salt a day, which is a barbaric amount. Two cups of raw leafy greens have enough sodium to cover the loss. Plus this kind of sodium is organic and nicely balanced.
• Use sodium free condiments to flavor your food. Your taste will adapt in a relatively short time.
• Depending on sodium for flavor will always put you at risk of overtaxing your body in too many ways, whether you have cancer or not.
• Use only unrefined raw sea salt as your exclusive source of sodium (and other minerals), but use it sparingly.
• Avoid other sources of sodium: table salt, sea salt, celery salt, vegetable salt, Bragg Liquid Aminos, tamari, soy sauce, “lite salt”.
• Stay away from pickled foods. Despite their digestive benefits they contain too much sodium.
• Include more potassium in your diet by eating raw fruits and veggies. You may also consider taking an organic form of potassium, or flavoring your food with a salt substitute product called Nu-Salt, in case you can’t live without the flavor.
• Raw apple cider vinegar’s main ingredient is potassium. It’s the best tasting and most natural salt substitute I found, if you can tolerate it.
• Do not cook with any kind of salt. Sea salt loses its properties and its taste when heated. You will end up using more because of it. Use raw sea salt always after cooking.
• You shouldn’t forget that unrefined raw sea salt is in fact concentrated sea water. Eating too much of it is like drinking gallons of sea water, without it’s main component: H2O. Our bodies are not designed to thrive with it, just the opposite.
• Not all raw unrefined sea salt is the same. Purity is not as important as sodium content. You might see different kinds of sea salt in the health food store shelf. It doesn’t matter if it comes from France, from New Zealand, from the Himalayas, if it’s pink, grey, blue, or any other color: It’s all salt. Read the labels. See the percentage of sodium. Most of them, as natural as they may look, are between 98% and 99% sodium. The one I use It’s called Vital Mineral Blend Celtic Sea Salt (Fine Ground) by the Grain and Salt Society. It has only 14% sodium.
• Epsom Salts and Baking Soda have too many anticancer benefits and uses to avoid their use. Leave these at the very end of your salt free lifestyle.

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Reccomended reading:

• FDA to consider salt content of processed foods
• FDA Is Urged To Toughen Rules on Salt (Intake Causing Deaths, Consumer Group Says)
• FDA Considers Limits on Salt
• FDA mulls stricter regulation of salt in food
• Salt And Stomach Cancer Risk