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During the heat wave in France this summer, messages to old persons were to drink regularly (which sometimes they forget) So a quarter of medical consultations

During the heat wave in France this summer, messages to old persons were to drink regularly (which sometimes they forget) So a quarter of medical consultations related to elders and heat was for a lack of salt [0]. From Google translate it’s call hyponatremia. So as stated in other comments, moderation, may be, lack, bad idea. I’m actually in Ireland. They seem to have taken the salt part very seriously, as everything need to be resalted (for me and my family). But everything is over sugared. [0] https://www.nouvelobs.com/societe/20180806.OBS0591/canicule-les-personnes-agees-doivent-aussi-veiller-a-ne-pas-trop-boire-d-eau.html https://www.nouvelobs.com/societe/20180806.OBS0591/canicule-... (in French) Edit : typos

chomp 8y ago
Yep. I go on longer (60+ mile) bike rides once a week. Salt is so important on those rides, I get severe cramps without it. Especially when cycling on 100+ degree days.
- jschwartzi 8y ago
  Yeah, I've hiked with people on low-salt diets and they've never failed to get a hyponatremia headache that gets better when they drink some electrolyte(salt). Frankly it doesn't make any sense to me to take an intervention that's good for high blood pressure and unilaterally try to apply it to perfectly healthy people. They did that with fat too and look where we are.
  - rorykoehler 8y ago
    Sodium causes high blood pressure. Electrolyte drinks don't contain sodium but magnesium (and some other salts) if i remember correctly.
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      Most electrolyte drinks contain both table salt (sodium chloride) and some potassium-based salt; some also contain magnesium salts.
    - tim333 8y ago
      It's more complicated than that, eg there's a study here where the high sodium folk had lower pressure https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/317099.php https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/317099.php and on the NHS known causes of high blood pressure list there are about 20 things https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/high-blood-pressure-hypertension/causes/ https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/high-blood-pressure-hypertensi...
    - jazoom 8y ago
      Sodium is essential for life, so you could say sodium prevents death. As always, the poison is in the dose. And, as already mentioned, drinking too much water and not consuming enough sodium leads to hyponatremia. Patients are always surprised when I tell them they're sick from too much water and not enough salt.
    - jschwartzi 8y ago
      Sodium in isolation might cause high blood pressure in certain people depending on the proportion of water and other electrolytes in their diet. Your body excretes water, sodium, and other electrolytes in proportion to maintain osmotic pressure within the cell and in the intracellular spaces. This is handled by the kidneys. If you over-consume any one electrolyte or water compared to a baseline osmotic pressure may increase or decrease until the body compensates. This is from the article. I'm not a doctor but I've taken some first aid classes where electrolyte and dehydration were covered in the context of hiking and backpacking. It's also possible to drain your body of electrolytes by sweating, because again the electrolytes must be present in proportion to the water and sweat contains electrolyte because the glands need the proper osmotic pressure to induct water. You may also drain electrolyte into your intestine because the body also needs the water to have the proper osmotic pressure to absorb it in the first place. This is why Oral Rehydration Salts have table and other salts in them. The body is extremely complicated, and I'm always very suspicious when someone tells me that "X causes X" without explaining the mechanism of action or the caveats. Every body is different and the same body in different situations will require different treatments. Complex dynamical systems frequently exhibit chaotic behavior. Chaotic systems have the feature that taking the same intervention and applying it at slightly different points in the system's evolution can produce wildly different sequences of further evolution. I hope that one day nutritional science will have advanced to the point where this is understood and expected during study design. But until that happens it's hard for me to believe many nutritional studies.
- TrisMcC 8y ago
  I run 70 miles per week, usually around noon each day in New England. I eat a very low sodium diet. All the sodium I get is naturally occurring in plants, and I do not seek out high-sodium vegetables like celery. I probably get around 500 mg. I sweat like crazy. My sweat is not overly salty. It's probably easier for me due to the volume of low-calorie density foods like starches, fruits, and vegetables. If I were eating a lot of high-fat foods like meats or oil I would likely not get enough salt. Once you are conditioned to a low-salt, no-added-sugar, no-oil diet, your tastebuds become highly sensitized to the existing tastes of the food. Salt deadens the tastebuds.
NoPicklez 8y ago
After doing endurance exercise 80km+ bike rides each weekend, sodium and other forms of electrolytes are incredibly important. Without them I lose fluids and I get crazy leg cramps. The issue is that salt tastes good, so people load it on their food to the point where it is unhealthy. It's the same with sugar, there is a huge industry bashing sugar at the moment, but sugar is essential for the human body. They are bashing sugar and creating fear because alot of people (myself included at times) eat way too much sugar, because its so easy to do, but it does create adverse health effects. That doesn't mean sugar is bad, just that eating copious amounts of highly refined sugar is bad for you. Try exercising without a healthy blood sugar level due to lack of complex sugars. Now we have this keto industry where people think twice about eating fruit due to it being high in sugar, FRUIT for god sake.
- maneesh 8y ago
  I agree with everything you say, except the second to last paragraph. My endurance increased immensely by switching to keto, due to no longer using glucose as an energy source (instead, ketones).
- nonbel 8y ago
  >"sugar is essential for the human body" Sugar is not essential to the diet, the body can make it from fat and protein. Ie, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis However, afaik, you cannot live without fat or protein in your diet. >"Try exercising without a healthy blood sugar level due to lack of complex sugars." You assume "healthy blood sugar level" must be related to "amount of sugar in diet". Not true, your body can adapt to different diets.
  - goldenkey 8y ago
    Consuming only fats and proteins stresses the body quite heavily. Carbs are the easiest calorie source to digest, there is almost no digestion required. Plus one can overload their body's compensatory mechanisms for acid base balance, due to the acidic ketones produced by gluconeogenesis. Its a terrible idea to do no carbs long term.
blubb-fish 8y ago
i usually drink a glass of water with a little bit of table salt. it's more isotonic and therefore more refreshing. the benefit is even more sensible when i do sports. fewer or no muscle spasms/jittering because the minerals of the salt improve nerve signaling.
marcosdumay 8y ago
I know that when I try to follow the recommended amount of added salt I get sick in 2 or 3 days. The total sodium one is impossible (one can eat more than it in fresh fruits!), so I never even tried. You talk about moderation, but there has been a large lack of moderation on the part of health professionals for recommending untested practices.
TheAceOfHearts 8y ago
A bit tangential, but if you do manage to cut on sugar... It completely transforms your palette. After a few weeks (or maybe months?) you can try an American candy-bar or soda and the sweetness is pretty overwhelming. I was addicted to soda growing up, and after quitting (or rather, greatly reducing), it completely blew my mind how many new flavors I was experiencing. One piece of advice: if you want candy with lower levels of sweetness, I'd suggest giving Japanese candies a try.

chomp 8y ago

Yep. I go on longer (60+ mile) bike rides once a week. Salt is so important on those rides, I get severe cramps without it. Especially when cycling on 100+ degree days.

jschwartzi 8y ago
Yeah, I've hiked with people on low-salt diets and they've never failed to get a hyponatremia headache that gets better when they drink some electrolyte(salt). Frankly it doesn't make any sense to me to take an intervention that's good for high blood pressure and unilaterally try to apply it to perfectly healthy people. They did that with fat too and look where we are.
- rorykoehler 8y ago
  Sodium causes high blood pressure. Electrolyte drinks don't contain sodium but magnesium (and some other salts) if i remember correctly.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    Most electrolyte drinks contain both table salt (sodium chloride) and some potassium-based salt; some also contain magnesium salts.
  - tim333 8y ago
    It's more complicated than that, eg there's a study here where the high sodium folk had lower pressure https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/317099.php https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/317099.php and on the NHS known causes of high blood pressure list there are about 20 things https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/high-blood-pressure-hypertension/causes/ https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/high-blood-pressure-hypertensi...
  - jazoom 8y ago
    Sodium is essential for life, so you could say sodium prevents death. As always, the poison is in the dose. And, as already mentioned, drinking too much water and not consuming enough sodium leads to hyponatremia. Patients are always surprised when I tell them they're sick from too much water and not enough salt.
  - jschwartzi 8y ago
    Sodium in isolation might cause high blood pressure in certain people depending on the proportion of water and other electrolytes in their diet. Your body excretes water, sodium, and other electrolytes in proportion to maintain osmotic pressure within the cell and in the intracellular spaces. This is handled by the kidneys. If you over-consume any one electrolyte or water compared to a baseline osmotic pressure may increase or decrease until the body compensates. This is from the article. I'm not a doctor but I've taken some first aid classes where electrolyte and dehydration were covered in the context of hiking and backpacking. It's also possible to drain your body of electrolytes by sweating, because again the electrolytes must be present in proportion to the water and sweat contains electrolyte because the glands need the proper osmotic pressure to induct water. You may also drain electrolyte into your intestine because the body also needs the water to have the proper osmotic pressure to absorb it in the first place. This is why Oral Rehydration Salts have table and other salts in them. The body is extremely complicated, and I'm always very suspicious when someone tells me that "X causes X" without explaining the mechanism of action or the caveats. Every body is different and the same body in different situations will require different treatments. Complex dynamical systems frequently exhibit chaotic behavior. Chaotic systems have the feature that taking the same intervention and applying it at slightly different points in the system's evolution can produce wildly different sequences of further evolution. I hope that one day nutritional science will have advanced to the point where this is understood and expected during study design. But until that happens it's hard for me to believe many nutritional studies.
TrisMcC 8y ago
I run 70 miles per week, usually around noon each day in New England. I eat a very low sodium diet. All the sodium I get is naturally occurring in plants, and I do not seek out high-sodium vegetables like celery. I probably get around 500 mg. I sweat like crazy. My sweat is not overly salty. It's probably easier for me due to the volume of low-calorie density foods like starches, fruits, and vegetables. If I were eating a lot of high-fat foods like meats or oil I would likely not get enough salt. Once you are conditioned to a low-salt, no-added-sugar, no-oil diet, your tastebuds become highly sensitized to the existing tastes of the food. Salt deadens the tastebuds.

NoPicklez 8y ago

After doing endurance exercise 80km+ bike rides each weekend, sodium and other forms of electrolytes are incredibly important. Without them I lose fluids and I get crazy leg cramps. The issue is that salt tastes good, so people load it on their food to the point where it is unhealthy. It's the same with sugar, there is a huge industry bashing sugar at the moment, but sugar is essential for the human body. They are bashing sugar and creating fear because alot of people (myself included at times) eat way too much sugar, because its so easy to do, but it does create adverse health effects. That doesn't mean sugar is bad, just that eating copious amounts of highly refined sugar is bad for you. Try exercising without a healthy blood sugar level due to lack of complex sugars. Now we have this keto industry where people think twice about eating fruit due to it being high in sugar, FRUIT for god sake.

maneesh 8y ago
I agree with everything you say, except the second to last paragraph. My endurance increased immensely by switching to keto, due to no longer using glucose as an energy source (instead, ketones).
nonbel 8y ago
>"sugar is essential for the human body" Sugar is not essential to the diet, the body can make it from fat and protein. Ie, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluconeogenesis However, afaik, you cannot live without fat or protein in your diet. >"Try exercising without a healthy blood sugar level due to lack of complex sugars." You assume "healthy blood sugar level" must be related to "amount of sugar in diet". Not true, your body can adapt to different diets.
- goldenkey 8y ago
  Consuming only fats and proteins stresses the body quite heavily. Carbs are the easiest calorie source to digest, there is almost no digestion required. Plus one can overload their body's compensatory mechanisms for acid base balance, due to the acidic ketones produced by gluconeogenesis. Its a terrible idea to do no carbs long term.

blubb-fish 8y ago

i usually drink a glass of water with a little bit of table salt. it's more isotonic and therefore more refreshing. the benefit is even more sensible when i do sports. fewer or no muscle spasms/jittering because the minerals of the salt improve nerve signaling.

marcosdumay 8y ago

I know that when I try to follow the recommended amount of added salt I get sick in 2 or 3 days. The total sodium one is impossible (one can eat more than it in fresh fruits!), so I never even tried. You talk about moderation, but there has been a large lack of moderation on the part of health professionals for recommending untested practices.

TheAceOfHearts 8y ago

A bit tangential, but if you do manage to cut on sugar... It completely transforms your palette. After a few weeks (or maybe months?) you can try an American candy-bar or soda and the sweetness is pretty overwhelming. I was addicted to soda growing up, and after quitting (or rather, greatly reducing), it completely blew my mind how many new flavors I was experiencing. One piece of advice: if you want candy with lower levels of sweetness, I'd suggest giving Japanese candies a try.