Many sweet foods popular with children contain potentially dangerous levels of salt which are putting their health at risk, a campaign group warns today.

Consensus Action on Salt and Health (Cash) said new research had found salt in desserts, sweet drinks and snacks of which parents were likely to be unaware.

Cash is calling on parents to check labels carefully and stop buying very salty foods for their children. The charity also urges manufacturers to lower the amount of salt they put into children's foods and to provide clear salt labelling to help parents make informed choices.

Eating too much salt is linked with high blood pressure, which increases the risk of strokes and heart disease.

Cash's research into food products on sale this month found that an Asda rolypoly fresh 114g pudding had 1.1g of salt - 55% of the recommended daily maximum for under-threes and 36% for four- to six-year-olds. A Heinz tinned treacle sponge pudding had 0.8g of salt per quarter of a tin - 40% of the average daily maximum for a child aged one to three and 27% for a child aged four to six.

Professor Graham MacGregor, Cash's chairman, said research showed children with high-salt diets had higher blood pressure, which was putting their health at risk in the longer term. "We want to see all manufacturers doing everything they can to reduce the salt they put in children's food," he said. "If they really cannot reduce the salt content in food eaten by children to reasonable levels perhaps they should consider ceasing production?"

A joint survey of 2,375 parents carried out by Cash and the parenting website Netmums.com found many respondents were unaware of high salt levels in sweet foods. Only 3% of parents knew that a blueberry muffin had more salt than two standard bags of crisps.

The daily recommended maximum salt intake for children depends on their age. It starts at 2g a day for children aged one to three years, rising to 3g daily for youngsters aged four to six. Children aged seven to 10 should eat no more than 5g a day, the Food Standards Agency says.

A spokesman for Heinz said: "Heinz has been praised for reducing salt in beans, soups, pasta and ketchup. When it comes to our tinned sponge pudding, Cash and the Food Standards Agency accept we would need to add lots more sugar if we took the salt out."

A spokesman for the Salt Association dismissed the new campaign as "shoddy", and said it misrepresented research which shows that only that the amount of food children consume affects their health: "Salt consumption is merely a byproduct. To attempt to pressurise health policy on the basis of such conclusions is dangerous. The results claimed are variable and make no allowance for differences between the sexes and height that can greatly affect blood pressure. It isn't new and it certainly isn't helpful."