ฺิิBy John Elliott
From The Sunday Times
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A SCIENTIFIC study into the controversial Atkins diet suggests that it can be one of the most effective ways for women to lose weight.
At the end of 12 months, overweight subjects on the Atkins regime had lost twice as much weight on average as women on three competing diets. Atkins minimises carbohydrates, such as bread and sugar, in favour of meat and other proteins.
However, amid increasing concern that its devotees miss out on vital nutrients, it has recently been supplanted by new regimes such as the GI diet, which consists of foods that release glucose slowly and evenly into the bloodstream.
This week, however, the study will say Atkins produced more weight loss with no signs of undesirable side-effects.
“So many people have been asking questions about diets for years. We think it’s time to give them some answers,” said Christopher Gardner, professor of medicine at Stanford University’s disease prevention research centre in California, who led the study.
“We have an epidemic of obesity that’s still on the rise, and the ideas of our best and brightest people haven’t been able to change that.”
In the study, 311 pre-meno-pausal, overweight women were asked to follow one of four regimes: the Atkins, Zone, Learn or Ornish diet. Each involve a different level of carbohydrate intake. The Atkins diet recommends the lowest level, the Zone diet a little more.
The Learn (Lifestyle, Exercise, Attitudes, Relationships and Nutrition) diet follows the American government’s recommendations for a diet low in fat and high in carbohydrates.
The Ornish diet is very high in carbohydrates and extremely low in fat.
After a year, the 77 women in the Atkins group lost an average 10lb — about twice as much as those on the Learn and Ornish diets. Women on the Zone lost an average of 3.5lb.
Women in the Atkins group also achieved larger reductions in body mass index, triglycerides and blood pressure — all signs of improved health.
Susan Jebb, head of nutrition and health research at the Medical Research Council, said the reason for Atkins’s success was that people found a diet that allowed high intakes of meat and fat easier to follow than other more spartan regimes.
In Britain, the Atkins diet reached its peak popularity around 2003 when a survey indicated that 3m people were on it. It was endorsed by celebrities such as Jennifer Aniston. Its popularity has since waned.
Has Atkins worked for you or are other diets better?
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