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It is estimated that there are approximately 73 million adults in the United States alone today who are suffering from high blood pressure and that more than 50,000 people will die as a direct result of the condition during the next year. Sadly, many of these deaths are preventable and one of the simplest and fastest ways to reduce your blood pressure is to change your diet.We have witnessed major changes in our lives in recent years and one especially significant change for a lot of us is seen in the food we eat. Those times of three home-cooked meals every day have gone and have been replaced by to a large extend with convenience and fast foods which has led to a number of different problems including the growing problems of obesity and high blood pressure. Fortunately, this is a situation which it is very easy to reverse. There are two major difficulties with most fast and convenience foods and these are fat and salt, both of which have been clearly proven to increase your blood pressure.Salt is added to an enormous range of food during the manufacturing and packaging process to add flavor and to act as a preservative and your daily salt intake can be extremely high without even adding further salt to your meals at the dinner table. In particular, canned foods normally contain high levels of salt as do frozen dinners and pizza, so look closely at the labeling and determine exactly how much salt (sodium) products have in them before you purchase them. Your total daily intake of salt should be as low as possible but ought not to be greater than 2,400 milligrams which is about a teaspoonful.Fat is another enemy when it comes to high blood pressure and, although some fat in your food is good for you, high fat food should be avoided whenever you can. In addition to fats and oils themselves (such as butter, margarine, lard, vegetable oil and meat dripping) a lot of our favorite foods are high in fat. Keep an eye out for foods such as cream, sausages, corned beef, fried chicken, french fries, cookies, cream cheese, salami, nuts, bacon, pies, whole milk, regular ground beef, cakes, ice cream, cheddar, pastries and nearly all fast foods.Now at this stage you may be thinking that this list of food items contains almost everything you eat and that if you cut all this out of your diet you will starve to death. The good news is that this is far from the case and that the choice of foods open to you is enormous. There are two ways to address the problem.The first is to merely replace items in your current diet with foods which are lower in salt or fat. For instance, you might replace normal full-fat milk with half-fat or semi-skimmed milk and regular ground beef with lean ground beef. The second is to introduce new foods into your diet and to replace some of your current favorite high fat foods. For instance, add more fresh fruit and vegetables into your meal plan and replace french fries with boiled potatoes and instead of frying food {try grilling|grill it. Grilled meat and fish is not only far better for you but it also tastes delicious.High blood pressure does not need to be a problem for most people and a few simply changes to what we eat can resolve the problem easily and quickly.
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