World Salt Awareness Week 2025

World Salt Awareness Week aims to encourage the implementation of evidence-based interventions to reduce salt consumption in the population. The primary health effect associated with diets high in sodium is raised blood pressure, which increases the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), gastric cancer, obesity, osteoporosis, Meniere’s disease, and kidney disease.

PAHO supports Salt Awareness Week by joining efforts with the international community and promoting policy actions to reduce salt intake in the Region of the Americas and protect public health. In many countries, three-quarters of dietary sodium comes from processed and ultraprocessed foods such as sauces and dressings, bread, crackers, cookies, ready-to-eat meals, processed meats, and cheeses. An effective way of reducing population sodium intake is reducing sodium content in frequently consumed foods and implementing other regulatory actions to support the population in making informed purchase decisions. We encourage governments to adopt sodium reduction policies and the public to play their part by making simple but significant changes to their eating and purchasing habits.

PAHO joins the global community effort by sharing technical tools to develop and implement comprehensive policies for salt reduction, especially salt reduction targets, as well as social marketing to promote healthy practices at home, schools, and workplaces.

How can you reduce your sodium intake?

eat mostly fresh, minimally processed foods
remove the saltshaker/container from the table
cook with little or no added sodium/salt
use herbs and spices to flavor food, rather than salt
replace regular table salt with lower-sodium salt substitutes that contain potassium
limit the use of commercial sauces, dressings and instant products
limit the consumption of processed foods
choose foods with lower-sodium content, or low-sodium products.
If front-of-pack warning labels are available in your country, choose products that are not labeled as “high in” or “excess in” salt/sodium.

Best-buys to reduce salt/sodium consumption

That consumption of salt/sodium adversely affects blood pressure is irrefutable. The WHO recommends consuming less than 5 g/ salt (< 2 g of sodium) per adult daily from all sources. Salt/sodium consumption in the Region of the Americas is well above the recommended limit, and the WHO estimates that the mean population salt intake in adults aged 25 years and more is 8.5 grams per day, which far exceeds the physiological requirement and is 1.7 times higher than the WHO recommendation. The WHO launched the SHAKE technical package, recommending the implementation of a series salt/sodium reduction interventions, aiming a 30% relative reduction in mean population intake of sodium between 2010 and 2025.

The reduction of salt/sodium consumption is one of the most cost-effective interventions to prevent hypertension and CVDs. The interventions to achieve it include:

Reformulate food products to contain less salt/sodium and set target levels for the amount of salt/sodium in foods and meals in a mandatory fashion.
Establish a supportive environment in public institutions, such as hospitals, schools, workplaces, and nursing homes, to enable the provision of lower-sodium options.
Behavior change communication and mass media campaigns through social marketing to raise awareness on salt consumption reduction.
Implementation of standards for front-of-pack labeling and marketing restrictions.
Surveillance: Measure salt/sodium population intake, salt/sodium food content, and salt/sodium dietary sources.

Event

Join us for the "Advances in Salt Reduction in the Americas" webinar during the 2025 Salt Awareness Week, May 12-18. This webinar will provide an overview of the SHAKE 2.0: Less Salt, More Health technical package and provide country experiences in implementing regulatory and social marketing interventions for sodium reduction.