China to Further Promote Iodized Salt

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, April 05, 2002

China to Further Promote Iodized Salt

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The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), together with seven Chinese government departments, is seeking logos and slogans with the theme of promoting iodized salt to protect children's mental development in China.

Ye Lei, an UNICEF official in charge of the project, said the activity is a prelude to China's further efforts to promote the use of iodized salt in a bid to protect children's mental development and better exploit China's human resources.

Iodine, merely one two-millionth of a human's weight, has the most direct influence on the mentality. Surveys done by the Ministry of Public Health and the China Disabled Persons' Federation show that among 11 million handicapped people, 90 percent were victims of iodine deficiency before they were born.

Ye said that since the United Nations decided in 1990 to basically eradicate iodine deficiency disease (IDD), China has made remarkable progress in promoting iodized salt and preventing IDD.

Statistics show that in 1995 only 40 percent of Chinese cooked with iodized salt, but the number had jumped to 90 percent in 2001. The work at present is focused on shielding the other 10 percent of the people from the threat of IDD, he said.

In 1994, China made an international pledge to eliminate IDD throughout the country. To this end, the Chinese government exerts a monopoly in the sale of table salt.

With the implementation of the monopoly, China has made great progress in eliminating IDD. In recent years, a total of one billion yuan (about 120.48 million U.S. dollars) has been invested in iodized salt projects, boosting the annual production to 8.1 million tons, which can basically meet the demand of China's 1.3 billion population.

About 95 percent of Chinese households now use iodized salt, and incidences of child thyroid enlargement decreased from 20.4 percent in 1995 to 8.8 percent in 1999.

However, due to geological, ideological and economic reasons, about 100 million Chinese are still living in iodine-deficient conditions, said Hao Yang, an official of the Ministry of Public Health.

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