Three days’ intake of salt found in one sample of Asian soup noodles as Hong Kong Consumer Council warns of health risks
Study conducted by Consumer Council and Centre for Food Safety found 76 of 100 samples contained sodium levels that exceeded WHO’s recommended daily intake
Lovers of Asian soup noodles are being warned of the health risks potentially lurking inside their favourite snack as a study showed more than 75 per cent of selected samples contained high sodium posing risks of high blood pressure and heart diseases.
The study, jointly conducted by the Consumer Council and the Centre for Food Safety on 10 types of Asian soup noodles, revealed 76 of the 100 samples contained levels of sodium that exceeded the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) recommended daily sodium intake of 2,000 milligrams for an average adult. The average sodium content of the samples was 350mg per 100g.
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They included noodles in tom yum soup, spicy rice noodles with pork belly and cuttlefish balls, barbecue pork ramen in pork bone soup, dan dan noodles with spicy and minced pork, stewed beef noodles and seafood laksa.
The sample with the highest sodium was a type of spicy rice noodles containing 6,000mg per bowl – treble the WHO limit.
“Eating one bowl of these rice noodles will consume three days worth of sodium in one sitting,” said Dr Henry Ng, the centre’s principal medical officer.
Another sample of spicy rice noodles contained 5,800mg per bowl, followed by a tom yum soup noodle sample with 5,400mg.