Excess salt raises blood pressure and with it the risk of heart disease and stroke, two of the UK's leading causes of death. The government's 2024 voluntary salt reduction programme set maximum and average limits across 108 categories of packaged and out-of-home foods, from bread to ready meals and takeaways. A study from Oxford's Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, published in the journal Hypertension, asks what would happen if industry actually met those targets.
Combining national diet survey data with the PRIMEtime population health model, the researchers estimate that full compliance would cut average adult salt intake from 6.1 to 4.9 grams a day, a reduction of around 17.5 per cent, lowering systolic blood pressure by about one point across the population. Individually modest, these shifts compound at scale: over 20 years the model projects 103,000 fewer cases of ischaemic heart disease and 25,000 fewer strokes.
The modelling also points to 243,000 additional quality-adjusted life years and around one billion pounds in NHS healthcare savings over the population's lifetime. Unlike dietary advice, which individuals struggle to follow consistently, reformulation requires no action from consumers, which is why the World Health Organization regards it as among the most cost-effective public health strategies available. The findings strengthen the case for making the UK's voluntary targets enforceable.