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Scientists: salt deficiency triggers mechanisms similar to heroin addiction
Medical expert of the article
Last reviewed: 30.06.2025
As a joint study by American and Australian scientists has shown, salt is addictive, and in the case of a deficiency of this substance, the same genetic and neurological mechanisms are triggered as in nicotine, heroin or cocaine addiction, writes the Daily Mail, citing the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
According to experts, this is an "ancient instinct" embedded in the brain that reflects the importance of salt to the human body. According to Melbourne University professor Derek Denton, "in this study we have shown that such a classic instinct as a craving for salt provides the neural organization that serves addiction to opiates and cocaine."
Along the way, "an evolutionary mechanism of great survival significance" was discovered (the tabloid again cites Denton), the essence of which is that the signal about the intake of salt into the body reaches the brain much faster than the substance itself gets there after being absorbed by the digestive system with the bloodstream, namely within about ten minutes. This makes animals, including humans, less vulnerable to predators, the researchers are convinced.
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