The New York City Board of Health reached two important decisions on Wednesday, one decent and one that could have dreadful consequences for some infants.

The good news first. The board voted unanimously to require fast-food restaurants to post warning labels — a saltshaker in a black triangle — next to the sodium bombs on their menus. That is, dishes with more than 2,300 milligrams of sodium, which the federal government says should be the daily limit for most people. For people who are at greater risk of heart attack or stroke, are middle-aged or older, are African-American or have high blood pressure, that number falls to 1,500 milligrams.

These first-in-the-nation sodium labels fit neatly with the efforts of the city under Mayor Michael Bloomberg to fight obesity, secondhand smoke and trans fats. Mayor Bill de Blasio and his health commissioner, Dr. Mary Bassett, are right to advance that mission. It only makes sense to let people know if they’re blowing through their daily sodium limit with a single burger.

Image A baby is dressed after a metzitzah b’peh circumcision ceremony last year. Credit... Michael Nagle for The New York Times

The department’s other decision was to abandon efforts to crack down on metzitzah b’peh, the ancient ritual of ultra-Orthodox Jews in which the circumciser, or mohel, sucks blood from a newly cut penis with his mouth. Public-health authorities, like the American Academy of Pediatrics, have long warned about the dangers of mohels infecting babies with the herpes virus, which can be deadly to infants.