A representative for the Food Products Association asked the American Medical association why they were singling out salt as a health risk to the American public. Predictably, they cited evidence that salt may cause an increased risk of elevated blood pressure and heart disease. But is an increased risk enough to label salt as a danger?

There is no denying that there is a lot of salt in the foods we eat. The recommended daily amount of salt is about 2,400 mg, which is roughly a teaspoonful. Many people consume double that in a day. But the salt that we add to our homemade chicken dinners is not the problem; the greatest source of sodium in our diets is processed food. For example, a Big Mac contains over 1000mg of salt - half the recommended allowance. Unfortunately, because this salt isn't readily apparent to the eater, people don't know its there - and if they are told by their doctor to watch their salt intake, or take to heart the advice from the AMA, they end up watching the wrong places.

The seemingly obvious way to cut out salt is to take it out where it is visible. Many people end up leaving foods unsalted (and bland) at home and eat out more to avoid not salting their foods. Homemade cookies have 1/2 teaspoon of salt in them? The homemade bread has 2 teaspoons? That may sound like a lot, but realize that the cookies packaged at the store have more, it just wasn't put there by you. This is another trap that people fall into, leaving out salt in places where it is required by recipes for fear of having too much salt in general. 

The tastelessness of this modified own cooking can lead people to eating out even more and buying more processed foods, where even "low salt" options will have more salt than they would put on foods they prepared themselves.

If you really want to cut down on salt, don't cut it out in things that need it, like the bread and cookies mentioned above, unless you are planning to eat the whole batch/loaf at once – and if you are, salt is probably not the main thing in your diet that you need to watch. Instead, use spices to add dimension to food and do more of your cooking at home, where you can still salt your food, but can be certain that the sprinkle or two you add is the only salt it has.