High intakes of sodium have been pointed out as one of the causes of high blood pressure. Carbonated drinks are highly consumed in Brazil but there is no data on their levels of sodium. The present work analyzed 97 samples, encompassing 14 brands and 7 types of soft drinks (cola, guaraná, lemon, orange, grape, soda and tonic water). The sodium concentrations varied between 19 and 202mg Na/L. The beverages sweetened with sugar exhibited an average of 74 ± 13mg Na/L while the artificially sweetened drinks had an average 151 ± 39mg Na/L. This means that the "light" carbonated beverages contain twice the amount of sodium of the ones sweetened with sugar. An average soft drink consumer in Brazil (259mL/day) may ingest about 19mg of sodium from the beverage if he prefers sugar sweetened types and 39mg Na/day in case he prefers the light types. On the other hand, a heavy consumer (2L/day) would ingest about 300mg Na/day only from soft drinks and this should be taken into consideration by persons under low sodium diet.
sodium; non-alcoholic beverages
