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American Morning

'Paging Dr. Gupta'

Aired February 12, 2004 - 08:45   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Americans are getting plenty of water, but they need to shake the salt habit.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us from the CNN Center with details of a much anticipated report on nutrition.

Hey, Sanjay. Good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad.

Yes, there's an old adage about drinking eight glasses of water a day. Certainly, we were told that growing up, and a lot of parents still telling their kids. It's an adage, but there may be some science to actually talk about how much water we really need. This has been a much anticipated report, coming out of the Institute of Medicine, trying to figure out how much we should be taking in, in terms of hour overall hydration. Food, water coming from food, beverages, things like that.

Here's a guide that they came out of this report. Let thirst be your guide, an important thing. If you're thirsty, obviously, you should drink. Most people get enough, though, at meals and social situations. Eight percent of our overall hydration coming from drinking water, other beverages, including caffeinated beverages. I want to talk a little more about that. And 20 percent coming from food.

Now if you're curious as to how much water, roughly, people are getting, how much hydration, women, about 2.7 liters, enough to make them feel adequately hydrated on average for a woman, and a man, about 3.7 liters. Those numbers could change, obviously, in you're in a hot climate or if you're exercising a lot. That's quite a bit of fluids if you look at it. We had -- for sake of reference, we have water bottles here. This is three litters of water; you know, women, say, about 2.7 liters.

But, again, a lot of that hydration coming from other sources. I think that's the point here, Soledad. You are getting plenty of hydration if you are eating or drinking normally.

O'BRIEN: What if you're eating, or drinking or getting it from other sources, you know, from caffeine, which is also a diuretic, like you drink a lot of coffee or you Drink a lot of tea? doesn't that work against the hydration part of it?

GUPTA: That has been a concern. It's a very good point, because when you think about caffeine, you do think it has some of the same qualities as a water pill, which may make you lose your hydration. That was studied in fact as well by this institute. What they find, really, that's more of a transient effect. There is some diuretic quality to it.

But overall, even if you're drinking caffeinated beverages, such as soda, such as coffee our tea, or something like that, you are still getting the benefits of the hydration without losing too much of a cumulative water effect. So a good point, but they say still count it toward your overall hydration.

O'BRIEN: That's interesting.

OK, let's talk a little bit about what else the study talked about, which was sodium and potassium, too.

GUPTA: Interesting finding as well. You talk about sodium. That's salt. And a lot of people have already trying to be conscious about that in terms of health, cutting down on the amount of sodium in their diets, but there's some new regulations coming with regards to that, too. The current recommendations for salt intake, sodium intake, is about 2.4 grams a day, and the new recommendation is going to be 1.5 grams. The current average, though, how much we take right now, four grams a day. The average American eats about 4 grams of salt a day, so clearly way too high.

The was you are going to see that sort of manifest itself though, Soledad, interestingly, on labels of food, where it says 40 percent of your sodium intake. All of a sudden products that you thought were 40 percent of your sodium intake are going to go up to 60 or 70 percent, so you're going to have to watch those labels. Most people get too much of their sodium from processed foods and from eating out. Restaurant food notorious for having too much sodium as well -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Sanjay, you talk about potassium, could I ask you a question about sodium? I thought the rule of thumb was, if it's not an issue for you, if you don't have hyptertension, or high blood pressure, then it doesn't really matter if you're getting to much salt, it's not necessarily bad for you, isn't that accurate?

GUPTA: Well, here's the thing, is that overall as a society, we probably take in too much salt. You're right, for a lot of people, it may not ever be an issue, but for now the number of people who are hypertensive seems to be increasing, and a lot of that could be attributed to diet.

It's pretty simple with sodium more than other things -- if you are eating too much of it, you're more likely to develop problems of hypertension in the long run. If you decrease, you're probably going to control your hypertension, so it's sort of one of those more preventative things more than anything else -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: All right, the little bit of time we have left, let's talk about potassium. Where do you find potassium and how much potassium should we be getting? GUPTA: Real quick, we talked about sodium, we're getting too much, potassium, we're not getting enough. You're going to see some new recommendations there coming out as well, 4.7 grams is going to be the recommendation as far as potassium goes. That's a lot of potassium. That's about 10 servings of fruit and vegetables a day, which is a lot, granted. But they say the more you eat, the less bone loss you are going to have, better for your kidneys, eat more potassium, drink more water, eat less sodium, bottom line.

O'BRIEN: That's the take-away. All right, Sanjay, thanks a lot.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired February 12, 2004 - 08:45   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Americans are getting plenty of water, but they need to shake the salt habit.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us from the CNN Center with details of a much anticipated report on nutrition.

Hey, Sanjay. Good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad.

Yes, there's an old adage about drinking eight glasses of water a day. Certainly, we were told that growing up, and a lot of parents still telling their kids. It's an adage, but there may be some science to actually talk about how much water we really need. This has been a much anticipated report, coming out of the Institute of Medicine, trying to figure out how much we should be taking in, in terms of hour overall hydration. Food, water coming from food, beverages, things like that.

Here's a guide that they came out of this report. Let thirst be your guide, an important thing. If you're thirsty, obviously, you should drink. Most people get enough, though, at meals and social situations. Eight percent of our overall hydration coming from drinking water, other beverages, including caffeinated beverages. I want to talk a little more about that. And 20 percent coming from food.

Now if you're curious as to how much water, roughly, people are getting, how much hydration, women, about 2.7 liters, enough to make them feel adequately hydrated on average for a woman, and a man, about 3.7 liters. Those numbers could change, obviously, in you're in a hot climate or if you're exercising a lot. That's quite a bit of fluids if you look at it. We had -- for sake of reference, we have water bottles here. This is three litters of water; you know, women, say, about 2.7 liters.

But, again, a lot of that hydration coming from other sources. I think that's the point here, Soledad. You are getting plenty of hydration if you are eating or drinking normally.

O'BRIEN: What if you're eating, or drinking or getting it from other sources, you know, from caffeine, which is also a diuretic, like you drink a lot of coffee or you Drink a lot of tea? doesn't that work against the hydration part of it?

GUPTA: That has been a concern. It's a very good point, because when you think about caffeine, you do think it has some of the same qualities as a water pill, which may make you lose your hydration. That was studied in fact as well by this institute. What they find, really, that's more of a transient effect. There is some diuretic quality to it.

But overall, even if you're drinking caffeinated beverages, such as soda, such as coffee our tea, or something like that, you are still getting the benefits of the hydration without losing too much of a cumulative water effect. So a good point, but they say still count it toward your overall hydration.

O'BRIEN: That's interesting.

OK, let's talk a little bit about what else the study talked about, which was sodium and potassium, too.

GUPTA: Interesting finding as well. You talk about sodium. That's salt. And a lot of people have already trying to be conscious about that in terms of health, cutting down on the amount of sodium in their diets, but there's some new regulations coming with regards to that, too. The current recommendations for salt intake, sodium intake, is about 2.4 grams a day, and the new recommendation is going to be 1.5 grams. The current average, though, how much we take right now, four grams a day. The average American eats about 4 grams of salt a day, so clearly way too high.

The was you are going to see that sort of manifest itself though, Soledad, interestingly, on labels of food, where it says 40 percent of your sodium intake. All of a sudden products that you thought were 40 percent of your sodium intake are going to go up to 60 or 70 percent, so you're going to have to watch those labels. Most people get too much of their sodium from processed foods and from eating out. Restaurant food notorious for having too much sodium as well -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Sanjay, you talk about potassium, could I ask you a question about sodium? I thought the rule of thumb was, if it's not an issue for you, if you don't have hyptertension, or high blood pressure, then it doesn't really matter if you're getting to much salt, it's not necessarily bad for you, isn't that accurate?

GUPTA: Well, here's the thing, is that overall as a society, we probably take in too much salt. You're right, for a lot of people, it may not ever be an issue, but for now the number of people who are hypertensive seems to be increasing, and a lot of that could be attributed to diet.

It's pretty simple with sodium more than other things -- if you are eating too much of it, you're more likely to develop problems of hypertension in the long run. If you decrease, you're probably going to control your hypertension, so it's sort of one of those more preventative things more than anything else -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: All right, the little bit of time we have left, let's talk about potassium. Where do you find potassium and how much potassium should we be getting? GUPTA: Real quick, we talked about sodium, we're getting too much, potassium, we're not getting enough. You're going to see some new recommendations there coming out as well, 4.7 grams is going to be the recommendation as far as potassium goes. That's a lot of potassium. That's about 10 servings of fruit and vegetables a day, which is a lot, granted. But they say the more you eat, the less bone loss you are going to have, better for your kidneys, eat more potassium, drink more water, eat less sodium, bottom line.

O'BRIEN: That's the take-away. All right, Sanjay, thanks a lot.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com