Those NFL snack ads are fun, but you should be careful of the foods they sell, study shows

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This Super Bowl Sunday, keep an eye out for bad calls, fouls and dangerous sodium levels.

Foods advertised in National Football League commercials contain an average of nearly 40% of the daily recommended sodium intake, according to a new study.

“We proved what probably a lot of people have long suspected, and that is that foods advertised during NFL games … are frequently high in sodium and calories and fat content,” said senior study author Dr. Paul Hauptman, dean of the University of Nevada, Reno’s School of Medicine and chief academic officer for Renown Health.

Researchers recorded 10 NFL games between September 2023 and November 2023 and analyzed the number and duration of commercials advertising food products. The team then looked at the nutritional information of those foods.

About 10% of the content, or 102 commercials, were advertising food, according to the study published Thursday in the journal JAMA Network Open.

The sodium content of those foods ranged from 220 milligrams to 1,872 milligrams, with a median amount of 910 milligrams, the study showed.

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends people consume less than 2,300 milligrams per day.

Fast-food restaurants advertised the products with the highest amount of sodium, the researchers found.

Salt’s impact on heart health

Eating too much salt can have many negative effects on your health.

High levels of sodium in a diet can lead to worsening of heart failure and hypertension, or high blood pressure, Hauptman said.

“Blood pressure is directly related to stroke, cardiovascular disease –– even to death from cardiovascular disease and heart failure,” said hypertension specialist Dr. Stephen Juraschek, an associate professor of medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School in Boston. He was not involved in the research.

“Hypertension affects nearly half the US population, 1.5 billion adults worldwide, and is growing,” he added. “This is a tremendous problem.”

Salt isn’t the only problematic ingredient in a lot of the foods advertised on television. The fat and calorie contents are often high as well, which can have an especially negative impact on people with diabetes, Hauptman said.

The emotions of eating

Many aspects of watching a football game can impact the way you eat. It’s a sedentary activity, people often serve special foods to share, and the commercials make unhealthy foods look exciting to eat, Juraschek said.

“Advertising in general is intended to encourage certain types of behaviors, and when you look at products when they’re being advertised, they’re usually showing people smiling in kind of memorable, exciting occasions, maybe with loved ones or friends,” he added.

Many of the elements that go into how you make your food choices are emotional, Juraschek said. Maybe you celebrate certain occasions with a particular food, or a certain dish is associated with spending time with people you love.

Advertisements may be trying to send you the message that partaking in the food they are trying to sell you will contribute to feeling close to your loved ones or having a good time, he added.

“And if those items are high in sodium and are highly processed … folks will be directed towards consuming more of those products, which is really concerning,” Juraschek said.

Because food choices are so often tied to traditions and memories and it can be so hard to adjust, Juraschek recommends being careful about what you are feeding children.

“It’s so important early on that we don’t overexpose young children to high sodium,” Juraschek said. “Getting them hooked at a young age can contribute to a lifetime of chronic disease and disability.”

How to reduce your sodium

Eating a healthy diet isn’t always easy.

One essential step is to recognize where the sodium in your diet is coming from, Juraschek said.

Many patients say they don’t add salt in their cooking, but it’s also important to look at the processed foods you eat –– such as breads and deli meats –– which can have a surprising amount of sodium.

“Whenever you get away from the produce and kind of the fresh meat sections of the store and get to the middle, you’d be like, ‘Wow, there’s so many different products here, but almost every single one, universally, has a large amount of sodium,’” Juraschek added.

Going to a restaurant also can result in higher sodium consumption than home-cooked food, he said.

Next, try to make simple switches to lower-sodium options, Juraschek said. Not all chips, dressings or dips have the same sodium content.

“We grow up with certain traditions, exposures –– we have memories around those food items,” he added. “That’s one way that we can still kind of enjoy that product, but maybe with less exposure.”

And you might find that, over time, you don’t miss the salt so much.

“Patients who are able to adhere to a low-sodium diet, not only are their symptoms better if they have heart failure, but their palate sort of adjusts,” Hauptman said.

Then, when patients are given foods high in sodium, they can taste it –– and they don’t often like it, he added.

“Eat in moderation, and just try to read labels,” Hauptman said.

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