It is said that there are nearly 73 million adults in the US alone today who are suffering from high blood pressure and that more than 50 thousand people will die as a result of the problem during the next year. Sadly, many of these deaths are preventable and one of the fastest and easiest ways to reduce your blood pressure is to adjust your diet.

We have witnessed dramatic changes in our lives in the last few years and one very significant change for a lot of us is seen in our eating habits. Those days of three square home-cooked meals every day have gone and have been largely replaced with convenience and fast foods which has caused a raft of different problems including the growing problems of obesity and high blood pressure. Fortunately, this is a situation which can be quickly and easily reversed.

There are two major difficulties with the majority of convenience and fast foods and these are fat and salt, both of which raise your blood pressure.

Salt is added to an enormous range of food during processing to add flavor and to act as a preservative and your daily intake of salt can be enormous without you adding further salt to your meals at the table. In particular, canned foods normally contain high levels of salt as do frozen dinners and pizza, so look closely at the label and determine just how much salt (sodium) products contain before you buy them. Your overall daily intake of sodium should be as low as possible but should not exceed 2,400 milligrams which is equivalent to about a teaspoonful.

Fat is another adversary when it comes to high blood pressure and, although a bit of fat in your food is good for you, you should steer clear of high fat food wherever you can. As well as fats and oils themselves (such as butter, vegetable oil, margarine, lard and meat dripping) a lot of our favorite foods are high in fat. Watch out for foods such as cream, fried chicken, nuts, cream cheese, whole milk, corned beef, pastries, sausages, ice cream, pies, french fries, cakes, cheddar and almost all fast foods.

Now at this point you might be thinking that this list covers almost everything you eat and that if you cut all of these out you will starve to death. Well, the good news is that nothing could be farther from the truth and that the range of foods still open to you is enormous. There are two ways to approach the problem.

The first is to simply replace items in your present diet with foods which are lower in salt or fat. For instance, you could replace ordinary full-fat milk with half-fat or semi-skimmed milk and regular ground beef with ground lean beef.

The second is to introduce new foods into your diet and to replace some of your current high fat favorites. For instance, add more fresh fruit and vegetables into your meal plan and replace french fries with boiled or baked potatoes and instead of frying your food {try grilling|grill it. Not only is grilled meat and fish much better for you but it also tastes delicious.

High blood pressure does not need to be a problem for most of us and a few simply changes to what we eat can solve the problem very easily and very quickly.