You should totally try. I heard that salt makes food taste better. Take two steaks, dip one in the sea or a salt mine and the other not, cook them both, and see which tastes better. Then lick your face and see when it’s saltier.
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You’re making a claim about the effect size in relative terms, not about the initial state of the patient. Yes, it would make sense to say to someone whose BP is 140/90, “your BP is about 20% higher than it should be”. But the effect size is not relative to the initial magnitude of the problem; regardless of their initial BP, people observe an absolute reduction of 2-4mmHg on a low-salt diet. Some people observe less, some more, at random.
The claim you made - that the patient is 20% (or whatever) closer to his goal - is useless information to him, because the question he will ask is “and how do I deal with the other 80%”? The sodium hypothesis has nothing further to offer.
Well … yes and no. Most people aren’t so stupid that they can’t grasp that 120 is OK, 140 is not, and 137 is within spitting distance of 140 and therefore still not OK.
But the “why should they care” bit is reasonable. They need not care. What they should care about is whether the doctor’s proposed intervention will actually make them live longer. Is there any evidence that this 2-4mmHg difference adds 20-40% to the patient’s life? If not, then the relative representation of this change is deceptive.
Um … really? He’s being told that doing something rather drastic will extend his life, or make it better in some way, when this is not actually true. It will do nothing good for him. It may even make him sicker. It will certainly make him unhappy, in various different ways.
One is too many, because the claim being made is so entirely useless that these people are being harmed for no reason whatsoever.
Not sure what you mean by that.
Is it totally out of the question that we simply tell him what the problem is, and how to fix it, and thereby give him the chance to actually get well?
But everybody doesn’t know it. What they “know” is that they have to eat low-fat diets, and count their calories, and not add any salt, and take their statins and their blood-pressure pills. And yet they keep getting fatter, and sicker. Someone made a comment earlier about Taiwanese people eating terrible food and not doing any exercise, and yet they at least look physically healthier than Americans, who are doing everything right. It’s a paradox!
The primary danger of giving people bad advice is not that it doesn’t work, but that it hinders their ability to trust, and follow, the correct advice.
@Taiwan_Luthiers made a sensible point earlier about the potential effects of a low-salt diet on the patient’s ability to exercise. I wonder if anyone has even examined this? It seems at least a plausible hypothesis, worth investigating.
That… doesn’t matter. Your 20% is probably a lot more meaningful to most than 2mmHg (for example) closer!
So you take the gains, and you move on. You’re the only one that seems to think anyone is saying this is the one and only thing to do / be concerned about.
Da.Fuq.Kind.Of.Logic.Is.That.? What else do you demand a perfect correlation in effect from an intervention before otherwise labeling it deceptive?
By and large, people who veer hard over are going to fuck themselves up one way or another. Beyond that, the whole “one is too many” argument elicits a big fat eye roll given the quantity and quality of idiots out there.
If you’re using a absolutely 100% literal definition of everybody, sure. Otherwise, yes they do. 
Yes, you two are some of the ones I’m thinking of veering hard over. Go forth and enjoy discussing your outliers. ;D
It’s the kind of logic the average person will bring to the situation. If you tell Mr Smith “well done, you’re 20% of the way towards a meaningful BP reduction!” he will expect that this has had a commensurate effect on his longevity.
If he says “so am I going to live longer?” and the doctor is compelled to say “uh, no, there’s no actual evidence that you will” then Mr Smith is going to say “well, bugger this for a game of soldiers, I think I’ll just add the salt to my food”.
I feel like the number of people that think that way is very small. You think it’s pretty average. I don’t think we have much common ground to continue this discussion. 
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Frankly, the way this discussion is going - and the experience of the last three years - perhaps you have a point. I always assumed that people made more-or-less rational decisions about their futures: that if a doctor was offering them something that promised only pain and no gain, they’d say “no thanks, if you can’t make my life longer, I at least want to enjoy what I’ve got left”.
But maybe I’m wrong about that. There do seem to be an extraordinary number of people who like pain, and don’t expect any gain. They will do absolutely anything in preference to the right thing; the thing that actually works. They will believe anything, however obviously nonsensical, rather than accept what is in front of their noses. But perhaps my point here is that they have abandoned rational decision-making about their own wellbeing because they are being so consistently misled by people they ought to be able to trust.
I don’t think most people would vaguely think it’s rational to think something like if they reduced they improved their bp 20-40% to baseline that they’d think it " adds 20-40% to the patient’s life." It’s not rational to arbitrarily link the percentage from one to the percentage from another. I think most people go the doctor because they have issue x, y, z, and the doctor suggests a, b, c. ie they have headaches, the doctor checks them out and says ‘hey, it looks like it’s likely to be caused by high blood pressure. improve your diet, with a focus on lowering salt, and get some exercise. If you don’t, you’re at higher risk of dropping dead.’ People want improvements, but that doesn’t mean they then think, “oh, if I improve my bp 20%, I’m going to live 20% longer!” That’s clown logic.
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I find this to be more and more common. Also I don’t people strive to live to 100 anymore, or even 90. Most people I know would be happy to make it to 80-85. So if all the healthy lifestyle is extending my life past 85, it’s not worth the effort.
Because this is Forumosa , a world renowned online forum of experts and sons of God.
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What’s the potential end result of high blood pressure ? Stroke. You don’t want to get a stroke at any age.
Nor do you want a heart attack or kidney problems.
It’s not about living longer only.
Regardless of health, when you are over 90 you won’t have much of a life anyways. So what’s 10 years of being bed bound?
I don’t think that’s the reason. Getting to 85 without major health issues is more likely why people want healthier lifestyle alternatives. I’m 56 real soon and getting in great shape. I want my next twenty to be injury and disease free.
Has nothing to do with prolonging my life. That’s just a side effect of good, healthy, thoughtful living.
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Do you drink alcohol ?
Eating a few extra grams of sodium isn’t going to affect anything. Getting enough exercise, eating right, is going to matter a lot more than how much salt you eat.
The people that are in their mid 70’s right now are who I am referring too. They are not in “good” health by today’s standards, but they are still fully functional, mobile and aware. Their doctors are telling them to stop doing this and that. But in their minds, they rather enjoy the next few years doing what they want instead of being limited. Now granted they could have a stroke or heart attack today or tomorrow, but they are willing to roll that dice.
Got a whole thread on that, brah.
Noop. Not a drop since 12/31/22.
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Well, that shit’s on them. The
Boomers in American have proven themselves again and again to be the most sociopathic people ever created. 
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Do share!
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Doing well. I don’t drink beer. Even most of the biblical references to wine is actually non fermented grape juice.
Anyway off topic , but congratulations.
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