Is the Atkins Diet Life-Threatening?
Friday March 17, 2006
Oh my. Hundreds of news articles about the woman who supposedly had life-threatening complications from the Atkins Diet. Statements such as “Low-carbohydrate diets could pose a serious health risk and are not a safe way to lose weight, according to a new report.” (Lorraine Heller) Headlines like “Atkins Diet Can Risk Your Life” (Daily Mail) and “Low-Carb Atkins Diet Isn’t Safe for Losing Weight, Doctors Say” (Bloomberg) are everywhere. What’s a poor dieter to think?
As is so often the case, most of these headlines are aimed at attracting readers, not informing them. All the dire articles are based on the case study of one woman (reported in this week's issue of The Lancet), who may or may not have been having negative consequences from her diet. She had been following what sounds like Atkins Induction (and possibly the 1972 version) for a month, and had lost 20 pounds. We have no idea from the reports whether this woman was getting an adquate nutrient intake from the particular food choices she was making. She began to feel sick and was vomiting multiple times per day. After 5 days of this, she entered the hospital and was diagnosed with a condition known as ketoacidosis, (not the same thing as ketosis, although the two are often confused).
Before you get alarmed, you must read Regina Wilshire’s analysis of this case study. She points out that there is quite a lot of evidence in the case report that other factors could easily have been responsible for the patient’s condition. And she makes the point that “we have thousands of participants from hundreds of studies to date and not one incident of ketoacidosis”.
Ms. Wilshire is exactly right. Low carb diets have been studied for decades, and the evidence has been mounting all that time that reducing carbohydrates is absolutely the healthiest way for many of us to eat. And the nutritional establishment has actually been responding, by slowly lowering its carbohydrate recommendations, all the while warning people not to cut carbs in their diets – go figure.
Is it possible that someone could have a negative reaction to any given diet? Of course. But even if this happened in this case, it is foolish to throw the baby out with the bath water. Anyone having a negative reaction to any diet should see their doctor and seek to modify the diet. Anyone having a negative reaction to a medication should see their doctor. Anyone having a negative reaction to an allergen should see their doctor. And yes, if a lot of people are having a bad reaction to a given medication, diet, or something in the environment, the alarm should of course be raised. But that is not the case with low carb diets as they are currently recommended and practiced, depsite the dire headlines.
Read What Other Low Carb Bloggers Are Saying
Related Resources:
As is so often the case, most of these headlines are aimed at attracting readers, not informing them. All the dire articles are based on the case study of one woman (reported in this week's issue of The Lancet), who may or may not have been having negative consequences from her diet. She had been following what sounds like Atkins Induction (and possibly the 1972 version) for a month, and had lost 20 pounds. We have no idea from the reports whether this woman was getting an adquate nutrient intake from the particular food choices she was making. She began to feel sick and was vomiting multiple times per day. After 5 days of this, she entered the hospital and was diagnosed with a condition known as ketoacidosis, (not the same thing as ketosis, although the two are often confused).
Before you get alarmed, you must read Regina Wilshire’s analysis of this case study. She points out that there is quite a lot of evidence in the case report that other factors could easily have been responsible for the patient’s condition. And she makes the point that “we have thousands of participants from hundreds of studies to date and not one incident of ketoacidosis”.
Ms. Wilshire is exactly right. Low carb diets have been studied for decades, and the evidence has been mounting all that time that reducing carbohydrates is absolutely the healthiest way for many of us to eat. And the nutritional establishment has actually been responding, by slowly lowering its carbohydrate recommendations, all the while warning people not to cut carbs in their diets – go figure.
Is it possible that someone could have a negative reaction to any given diet? Of course. But even if this happened in this case, it is foolish to throw the baby out with the bath water. Anyone having a negative reaction to any diet should see their doctor and seek to modify the diet. Anyone having a negative reaction to a medication should see their doctor. Anyone having a negative reaction to an allergen should see their doctor. And yes, if a lot of people are having a bad reaction to a given medication, diet, or something in the environment, the alarm should of course be raised. But that is not the case with low carb diets as they are currently recommended and practiced, depsite the dire headlines.
Read What Other Low Carb Bloggers Are Saying
Related Resources:
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