Substituting regular salt for pink Himalayan salt could lead to an iodine deficiency, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) warned.
There is a wide variety of salt on the market, including pink Himalayan salt, but while new varieties might be fashionable, they could pose hidden risks to health, the HPA said on its Web site on March 26, adding that some people assume that imported salts are better.
Since the 1960s, the government has been adding iodine to salt, but other governments might not have the same policy, it said.
Photo: Wu Liang-yi, Taipei Times
Using salt without added iodine over long periods could cause an iodine deficiency, it said.
Not only does iodine affect the thyroid, a long-term iodine deficiency could also affect development in children, it said.
Iodized salt should be the main salt used at home, which can be ensured by buying iodized salt, checking iodine content on nutrition information and buying products that contain potassium iodide or potassium iodate, the HPA said.
Su Hsiu-yueh (蘇秀悅), director of the Nutrition Department at Taipei Medical University Hospital, said that while she would not typically recommend getting iodine from table salt, because excessive salt consumption can lead to other health problems, people who do use salt without iodine should compensate by eating seafood or seaweed.
For those with seafood allergies or thyroid disorders, special attention needs to be given to iodine intake, Su said.
People with hyperthyroidism should adopt a zero-iodine diet, while people with severe hypothyroidism are typically prescribed levothyroxine, she said.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS