AS many as 52,000 lives could be saved if consumers dramatically reduced the amount of salt in their diets, research claims today.

The study, published in the journal Hypertension, said that if salt intake was cut from the current average of 12g per day to just 3g, it would prevent 20,500 deaths from stroke each year.

The reduction would also prevent 31,400 deaths from heart disease, according to researchers at St George's Hospital Medical School in London.

Campaigning group Consensus Action on Salt and Health (Cash) called for the food industry to cut the amount of salt in manufactured products.

They said this could be done without the public being involved and without them noticing and would be the easiest way of reducing strokes and heart disease, which kill a quarter-of-a-million people in the UK each year.

The food and drink industry says it has already taken action to cut the levels of salt in products such as breakfast cereal and bread.

The research showed that even a small reduction in salt intake of 10% (1g) would save 6,000 lives a year and prevent a further 6,000 strokes and heart attacks which people survive.

If adults limited their intake to 6g a day - the level recommended by the Government - the report said that 35,000 lives could be saved.

Feng He, one of the paper's authors, said, "Our research demonstrated that there is a dose response to salt reduction - the larger the reduction in salt intake, the larger the reduction in blood pressure.

"From the well-researched link between blood pressure and deaths from stroke and heart disease, we were able to calculate how many lives would be saved by reducing salt intake. "We showed that reducing salt intake by 9g per day, for example, from the current average of 12g per day to 3g per day, would prevent around 20,500 stroke deaths and 31,400 heart disease deaths per year.

"This equals almost 52,000 lives that could be saved each year."

Chairman of Cash, Professor Graham MacGregor, who also co-wrote the report, said the current 6g target was based on what the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition deemed to be feasible in the UK.

"We believe that the targets should be set according to the maximum potential health benefits, not according to the convenience of the food industry.

"Whilst the current 6g per day target will save many lives and prevent many from suffering strokes and heart attacks, we need to start planning to reduce salt intake by a further 3g per day.

"This would reduce all strokes in the UK by one-third and all heart disease by one-quarter of the current levels."

Around 80% of salt intake is said to come from processed foods and meals eaten in restaurants.