Salt and Cancer

A high salt diet and pickled foods increases the risk of cancer.

Diets containing high amounts of food preserved by salting and pickling are associated with an increased risk of cancers of the breast, stomach, esophagus, liver, nose and throat.

Salt (NaCl) is a prerequisite for life. You must have some and you can‘t avoid it. Excessive intake of salt, however, increases disease risk, including hypertension, arteriosclerosis, heart failure, renal disease, stroke, and cancer.

References Include

Strnad M. Sol i rak [Salt and cancer]. Acta Med Croatica. 2010 May;64(2):159-61. Croatian. PMID: 20649083.

Morais S, Costa A, Albuquerque G, et al. Salt intake and gastric cancer: a pooled analysis within the Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) Project. Cancer Causes Control. 2022 May;33(5):779-791. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10552-022-01565-y

Lian M. Salted fish and processed foods intake and nasopharyngeal carcinoma risk: a dose-response meta-analysis of observational studies. Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol. 2022 May;279(5):2501-2509. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00405-021-07210-9