Why not add salt to baby food?

Whether to add salt to infants' food is a common topic of debate between the older and younger generations. The mother who insists on science says: Do not add salt to children under 1 year old, eating too much is bad for the body! The mother-in-law who insists on experience says: How can you get strength without salt? We used to eat like this! Let's talk about it.

The sodium in food is enough for children's daily needs. The purpose of eating salt is to supplement sodium. Studies have shown that the appropriate sodium intake for babies aged 0 to 6 months is 170 mg per day; the appropriate sodium intake for babies aged 6 months to 1 year is 350 mg per day; and the appropriate sodium intake for babies aged 1 to 4 years is 700 mg per day. For children under 6 months old, the sodium content in mother's breast milk is generally 230 mg/L. As long as the child drinks enough milk every day, there will be no sodium deficiency. For children fed with formula milk, every 100 ml of formula milk contains 17.7 mg of sodium, which can be met by drinking about 960 ml of milk per day.

For children aged 6 to 12 months who have already started eating complementary foods, in addition to consuming sodium from milk, they can also obtain it through added complementary foods. In fact, most natural foods contain sodium, such as eggs, pork, cabbage, and even apples. A few hundred milliliters of milk a day, plus a little egg and meat, can easily reach 350 mg of sodium.

In short, the food that infants and young children usually eat is enough to supplement their daily needs, and there is no need to add salt. Almost all authoritative guidelines do not recommend adding salt to children under one year old. The 2016 edition of the "Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents" recommends that children's complementary foods remain original, without adding salt, sugar or irritating condiments.

Eating too much salt is harmful to children. First, it will cause children to develop a habit of heavy tastes and be prone to picky eating. If children are used to heavy oil and salt from childhood, natural food will hardly arouse their interest, and over time they will be prone to picky eating.

Secondly, it will cause children to lose calcium, affecting the development of bone height. Salt is composed of sodium chloride. If you take too much, the body will excrete the excess sodium, but calcium will also be lost. It is not unreasonable to say that "giving children less salt is equivalent to more calcium supplementation."

Finally, it increases the burden on children's kidneys and the risk of hypertension in adulthood. The excess salt we eat needs to be processed by the kidneys and excreted with urine, but the kidney function of children under one year old is not yet fully developed. Once sodium is excessive, it may cause damage to the children's kidneys. In addition, if a child develops a taste for salt, it will increase the risk of hypertension in adulthood. Hypertension is a high-risk factor for many chronic non-communicable diseases such as stroke and cardiovascular disease.

Although the harm of eating too much salt to children is not immediate, it will undoubtedly pose a great threat to their health in the long run. In short, children under one year old generally do not need to add extra salt, and they should also eat salt in moderation after one year old.

Without adding salt, the food still tastes good. Children's taste buds are more sensitive than adults at around 6 months old. As people age, their taste buds continue to degenerate. What adults think is just right is actually too salty for children; what adults think is light is just right for children.

Some people may ask: Why does the child resist and refuse to cooperate when eating complementary food?

This is because, before children have complementary foods, they eat slightly sweet breast milk or formula milk. When they first taste complementary foods, the unfamiliar taste will make them unable to accept it for a while. But soon, they will find that in addition to sweet, there are sour, astringent, and fresh, so many delicious flavors. Children don’t like complementary foods because the variety is not rich enough or they are too soft or hard. You can’t simply think that it has no taste without salt. Don’t many children still enjoy eating boiled cauliflower and carrots? In short, don’t measure children’s preferences by adults’ tastes.

Finally, even without adding salt, children’s strong taste sensitivity can perceive various flavors from the natural taste of food. For example, naturally sweet: fruits, cabbage, carrots, onions, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, fruit corn, sweet peas, etc.; naturally salty: marine fish, kelp, seaweed, dried shrimps, shellfish, cheese, seaweed, etc.; naturally fresh: mushrooms, pork, chicken, beef, lamb, fish, shrimp, shellfish, etc. These are enough for children to experience the various flavors of food.