Swap table salt for a potassium blend and almost 3 million deaths a year could be avoided
A Nature Health study published on 4 November, led by The George Institute, modelled replacing regular salt with potassium-enriched salt across 193 countries: 2.96 million fewer deaths a year from cardiovascular and kidney disease, and 10.17 million fewer new cases. People with advanced kidney disease, or on drugs that make the body hold on to potassium, are the exception.
If all the salt we eat were replaced with potassium-enriched salt, around 2.96 million fewer people would die each year worldwide. That is the central estimate in a study published on 4 November in Nature Health, by a team led by Australia’s George Institute for Global Health.
The model covers 193 countries and deals with cardiovascular disease (heart attacks, strokes) and chronic kidney disease. On top of the deaths, it puts the number of new cases avoided at 10.17 million a year.
What is potassium-enriched salt?
Salt in which some of the sodium chloride is swapped for potassium chloride. It works two ways: less sodium brings blood pressure down, and more potassium pushes it down further. The World Health Organization began recommending it in 2025.
The idea has form. In 2021 a trial of 21,000 people across 600 villages in China found that households cooking with it had 14% fewer strokes over five years. The new paper is a model rather than a trial: it takes effects like those and applies them to each country’s population.
Where would the most lives be saved?
China, at about 1.08 million a year, more than a third of the total. India, at almost 400,000. The UK, at close to 13,000.
The team ran five scenarios. Swapping only the salt used at home (the shaker and the cooking pot) would prevent 1.85 million deaths. Swapping only the salt in processed and restaurant food, 1.56 million. The two do not simply add up: each scenario was modelled on its own, and swapping all the salt at once gives the 2.96 million, less than the sum of the parts.
For Europe the second scenario matters more than it sounds. Bruce Neal, one of the authors, says more than 70% of the salt Europeans eat comes from processed products and meals out. Changing your own shaker helps, but the food industry would have to follow.
Who should not use potassium salt?
People with advanced kidney disease, and anyone on medication that makes the body retain potassium. For them, too much potassium in the blood (hyperkalaemia) can be dangerous. The study runs that number too: in this group the swap would cause around 100,000 deaths a year but prevent 750,000 through lower blood pressure.
The practical advice is short. If you have high blood pressure, kidney problems or take long-term medication, talk to your doctor before you switch. Blood pressure is, as it happens, one of the checks people in Portugal get most often, especially those with the least schooling.
Image: N509FZ / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
