Mr. Speaker, yesterday we marked the second anniversary of the election of the NDP as the official opposition in the House of Commons. I would like to acknowledge the exemplary work of my four assistants, Olivier Thibault, Katia Isabelle, Isabelle Bourassa and Camille Bouillon Bégin.
Today, I am very pleased to rise in the House to speak to Bill C-460, An Act respecting the implementation of the Sodium Reduction Strategy for Canada. This bill is very important to me.
First of all, I would like to say that foods high in sodium are the health scourge of the 21st century. Bill C-460 proposes a strategy to prevent thousands of needless deaths by reducing Canadians' sodium consumption. The government must address the issue of high sodium consumption, just as it tackled drunk driving and smoking a few years ago.
It is imperative that we lower sodium in foods to a safe level, improve food labelling, protect our children from misleading food advertising, ensure that public money is not used to pay for high-sodium foods and, above all, have Canada lead the way in food industry monitoring.
Our society is grappling with a deadly killer. Consuming too much sodium is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease in Canada. It also has devastating effects on the health of people suffering from serious illnesses such as stomach cancer, osteoporosis, asthma, obesity and kidney disease.
Sodium is a true blight on our health care system. We allocate time, money and human resources to the treatment of illnesses that are directly caused by the overconsumption of sodium, which is present in processed foods. Therefore, these resources are not available to fund research on and treatment for childhood diseases, congenital disorders and heart defects.
It is time to examine our conscience and make a choice. We can put in place a national sodium reduction strategy that will impose clear rules on the food industry, decrease Canadians' sodium consumption and help Canadians make healthier food choices. By reducing Canadians' sodium consumption to 1,800 mg a day, we could prevent almost 24,000 cardiovascular incidents a year. We could also prevent 10,000 to 16,000 deaths a year.
This government has proven to be particularly obsessed with the economy in recent years. Reducing sodium consumption would help save billions of dollars. For example, reducing our sodium consumption by 1,500 mg a day would generate direct savings of $1.38 billion in health care alone. Furthermore, if we include indirect costs, we could save $2.99 billion, which is almost $3 billion. That is a significant amount.