For years, I have gone on record highlighting the benefits of the “Mediterranean” diet . This was no second or third party pitch I was making. Having lived in Italy for almost 20 years, I have ample ‘first-hand’ experience of the diet and its many health benefits. At the same time, it was clear to me that this healthful diet was being misrepresented to fit the agendas of certain individuals and organizations in the health and consumer segments.

There is no doubt that everyone loves a winner and the hands-down favorite diet all around the world promoting good health is the Mediterranean diet, so naturally all the diet talking heads tried to pitch it in their favor. Lots of salads, vegetables and fruits, plenty of grains (bread and pasta), good cheeses, a lot of fish and a small amount of meat – that’s how all the Mediterranean diet promoters characterized it. And there is no doubt, the cardiovascular figures of Mediterranean residents are amongst the best in the world.

But all the pretenders in the medical institutions and the consumer group sector neglected to mention one very important aspect of the Mediterranean diet – it’s very high salt content. That can only mean one of two things. Either, they had no idea of what the diet actually was but pretended they did, or they knew it was a very high salt diet but purposely lied about it because it did not fit their agenda. After all, the urban myth was that high salt diets contributed to cardiovascular disease and if the Mediterranean diet was revealed to be high in salt, it would prove to be very embarrassing to their salt reduction agenda. Either way, it makes me wonder how consumers can still have any faith in the medical establishment when it comes to nutritional advice.

Aside from my personal experience of the food in Italy, there was a highly regarded publication by C. Leclercq and A. Ferro-Luzzi describing the high salt content of the Italian diet (1). This 20 year old paper was just reconfirmed by a recent study of A. Venezia et al, published in the May edition of the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition . And still, the Southern Italians continue to enjoy good cardiovascular health.

And salt is not a bystander to this good health paradigm. A key determinant of good health is the consumption of a sufficient amount of salads and vegetables. These foods contain the bulk of the essential water-soluble micro-nutrients we consume. You don’t get as many water soluble nutrients from any other source in the diet. And it is salt that makes salads and vegetables so tasty. Salt is what encourages a good, well-balanced diet. That is why we evolved to like salt as much as we do – because it keeps us healthy.

The doom and gloom prophets, the food police and the nutrition con artists are all preaching that our diet is killing us. Fortunately, most of us are blissfully unaware of this so we continue to enjoy life and thrive better than at any time in the entire history of mankind – just check out the health statistics on the CDC website .

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(1) C. Leclercq and A. Ferro-Luzzi, “Total and domestic consumption of salt and their determinants in three regions of Italy,” European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Mar, 45(3), 151-9, (1991).

(2) A Venezia, G Barba, O Russo, C Capasso, V De Luca, E Farinaro, F. Cappuccio, and P Strazzullo, “Dietary sodium intake in a sample of adult male population in southern Italy: results of the Olivetti Heart Study,” European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 64, 518-524 (May 2010).