Salty

Lefty asks:
Table salt is made up of sodium and chlorine. Yet we always refer to it as “sodium.” How come we never refer to salt content as “high chlorine” or “low chlorine?”

Background:
Sodium is an alkali metal. The alkali metals react with the nonmetals in Group VIIA (Fluorine, Chlorine, Bromine, Iodine, and Astatine) to form ionic compounds or salts. Side note - because they form salts with so many metals, the elements in Group VIIA are known as halogens.

Example: Chlorine reacts with sodium metal to produce sodium chloride, table salt.

So, back to the question at hand:
Since there are many types of salts, we refer to sodium chloride salt as simply "sodium." This to differentiate from, say, Potassium chloride salt. Both sodium and potassium salts provide the human body with essential electrolytes.