KFC and McDonald’s use widely varying levels of salt in same children’s meals
The Guardian | Press Association | Tuesday 18 August 2015
The same children’s meals at popular fast food chains have been found to contain hugely varying levels of salt in different countries, which campaigners say shows that the companies could reduce levels if they wanted to.
Research by campaign group World Action on Salt and Health (Wash) found that a KFC child’s meal in Costa Rica, if eaten twice a month for a year, contained 18 more teaspoons of salt than a child eating the same meal in the UK.
Its analysis of children’s meals sold in fast food restaurants in 37 different countries also revealed that eight out of 10 meals have more than 1g of salt per serving.
The maximum recommended salt intake for children aged four to six is 3g a day, and 5g for seven to 10-year-olds. Anyone older should eat no more than 6g of salt a day.
The UK performed better than most countries, with a Burger King child’s meal burger and fries containing 1.06g of salt and a Subway child’s turkey sub sandwich containing 1g, compared with 2.54g in Finland and 1.5g in Germany respectively.
