The Salt War reaches the cancer stage.

I can't wait to see the reaction when the Daily Howl-at-the-moon and its frothy-lipped commenters get hold of this one.

Salt gives you cancer.

Yes, following the tobacco control template to the letter, salt now gives you lumpy tum. There are so many people falling for the same trick every time that I have to wonder how they manage to find their way out of bed in the mornings. GPS perhaps?

Just as the drink argument now bypasses the most likely effect of excessiveness (pulverised liver) and goes to the iDeath of the Day, the pancreas, then on to cancer, the salt loons make no mention of the kidney damage which is likely to be the first effect of excessive salt intake. No, that's yesterday's disease. It has to be cancer.

Everything gives you cancer now. I remember reading, many years ago, about a study that used these same statistical games to prove that hot showers give you lung cancer. I have one of those every day but there's no need to worry. I clean out my lungs with a smoke afterwards.Shower cancer? Oooh, no, I don't want that.

I don't count units of booze per day because the limits are made-up numbers. I eat fruit and veg as and when I feel like it because the recommended intake is a made-up number.

I have never measured the amount of salt I use and am not interested in doing so. They talk about five grams a day but who's that for? Me? Someone twice my size? Someone half my size? Someone who drinks less than I do and who therefore flushes their system less often? Someone who drinks more? Someone whose kidneys are genetically more efficient than mine or someone whose kidneys are less efficient, someone whose gut absorbs salt more efficiently than mine or... you get the idea. The five grams is for the BMA's British Standard Human because they cannot understand that people are individuals.

Is it another made-up number? Well, why on Earth would I even consider for a moment that there was any research behind it? There has been none at all behind anything else. As Frank says, the medical profession is determined to be seen as a haven of quackery and about as reliable as a man in a grass skirt and wooden mask shaking bits of animal at you. They'll be prescribing it soon, you know. "Cancer? Take these stoat's entrails and wave them over the affected part twice daily." At least the only side effect will be stoat's blood on your shirt and possibly an increased level of interest from your cat.

The article comes from the food industry and smacks of the same appeasement tried by the tobacco and drinks industry. They do attempt to point out that with no salt at all, we'll all die but you just know 'no safe level' is on the way. They also point out that they don't put lots of salt in some foods just to be nasty. It's a preservative.

Roast pork was a staple of the old sailing ships.  They kept in in barrels full of salt. Not just a sprinkling. A barrel filled to the brim with salt. That stopped it going off. Possibly something of an overkill there but there is one important thing about salt that CASH don't know.

It stops the growth of Clostridium, a genus of bacterium which includes the species responsible for gas gangrene and for botulism. The genus includes other nasties too. The bacterium grows without oxygen and forms spores that can withstand boiling for at least ten minutes. They don't even notice pasteurisation. The spores can be dried out for years and still germinate. So tinned food is often in brine because even if one of these gets inside the can, they can't grow in salty solutions.

The extra salt you get when you eat these things is simply flushed out by your kidneys. Salt only becomes a problem if you eat vast amounts of it or if you don't take in enough fluids to keep the kidneys in flush mode.

Botulism is a far bigger problem. We've already seen the rise of rickets because of lunatic control freakery that only lets kids out in the sun if they are painted all over with enough sunblock to make them reflective. Those C. botulinum bacteria are rubbing their little flagella together in anticipation of their soon-to-be-announced comeback tour. Oh, and C. difficile will be on its way to a tin of carrots in your local shop too.

I still have plenty of salt. Hardly used any on the paths this year and I'll be increasing my supply.

There will be one benefit of the CASH lunacy. All the dopes who fall for it will be comatose so we won't have to listen to them. It won't take long. They'll be exercising regularly, not drinking and not eating anything with salt or fat in it so they should only take a couple of weeks to get to this stage.

Maintenance of a low salt diet for many months or excessive sweat loss during a race on a hot day can present a challenge to the body to conserve adequate sodium levels. 

It won't take months on a no-salt diet.

Keep it up, Righteous. Soon you will have killed all of your idiot drones.


I think I'll have a bag of pork scratchings to go with my whisky and tobacco this evening.