During Salt Awareness Week we will be raising awareness of the huge impact eating too much salt has on our health. No matter how hard you might try to reduce your salt consumption, your destiny is in the hands of the food industry as most of the salt we eat is already present in the foods we buy. Finding lower salt products sometimes feels like a game of hide and seek, but the food industry isn’t playing fair.

This year, we are encouraging everyone to contact their MPs and their favourite food companies to help make sure the options available to us have less salt and, in the long term, we can live longer, healthier lives.

So, how can YOU help us to spread the message?

Anyone can get involved in the week! We have a poster and leaflets available to download and order which you can use to hold your own event. You can help raise awareness of salt and health in hospitals, GP surgeries, libraries, schools, offices, community spaces. Any event, no matter how big, will play a part in helping to spread the message that eating too much salt, at any age, is harmful to our health.

In previous years, local events have included:

• Cookery demonstrations with taste testing sessions and low salt recipes
• A quiz on the effects that salt has on health and the simple ways to eat less salt
• Notice boards or stalls in your school or work canteen, your office or a local library
• If you are trained in blood pressure measurements, offer free blood pressure readings at your workplace and encourage people to lower their salt intake
• Practical activities
• guess how much salt is in a meal*
• arrange a selection of meals from highest to lowest salt content*
• spoon out how much salt you think is 6g or how much is in a meal*

* Use products such as ready meals, pizza, cheese and pickle sandwich, ham roll or a bowl of breakfast cereal with milk

If you do hold a local event, make sure you email us some photos cash@qmul.ac.uk or tweet us @actiononsalt

Join the Conversation

Tell your social networks about how you are getting involved in Salt Awareness Week! We will also be highlighting events taking place on or around the week on our website and social media - you can find us on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook and don’t forget if you are posting about Salt Awareness Week, use the hashtag #saltawarenessweek 

Get Writing

MPs are elected by YOU, for YOU. They are bound to address the issues that matter to you, and it is within their power to support salt reduction and help ensure that there are healthier options in supermarkets, restaurants and takeaways. If you want a say, then write to your MP and ask them what they are doing to reduce salt in food! 

You can also:

• Write to your local councillor to ask how they are addressing levels of salt in food sold in your community
• Write to your favourite restaurants and ask them to provide lower salt options
• Write to your favourite brands and ask them to reduce salt in their products