Low-Carb Diet Wins Another Food Fight

It's all over the news! Today's New England Journal of Medicine published the results of a two year study comparing three diets: a low-fat diet, a low-carb diet, and a "Mediterranean" diet. At the end of two years, as is usual, none of the diets had produced a large weight loss, but the low-carb diet edged out the other two, with a sustained 12 lb. loss compared to 10 for the "Mediterranean" diet and 7 for the low-fat diet.

Although the low-fat diet wasn't very low in fat and the low-carb diet wasn't very low in carbs, there are some lessons that we can take from this study that are real. I will be delving into various aspects of the study over the next few days, but here are some things to chew on:

• The low-carb diet can no longer be called a "fad" diet. It's real, it's healthy, and it's not going away.

• Many health markers were assessed along with weight loss, including cholesterol, triglycerides, markers for inflammation, and several others. There was no health risk marker on which the low-carb dieters were worse off than low-fat dieters at any point in the two years. In most of the markers, they were better off.

• There were some areas where the Mediterranean diet had an advantage. It could be the higher fiber level or the higher level of monounsaturated fats in that diet. There's no reason why these changes can't be added to a low-carb diet, in fact, on this site I do advocate a high-fiber low-carb diet with a balance of types of fat.

The media is already in "full spin mode" on this. On the Today Show, Dr. Nancy Snyderman implied that the low-carb diet wasn't really Atkins because the amounts of bacon and butter weren't high enough (one of the most widely-held myths about low-carb diets, and the Atkins Diet in particular). On Good Morning America, Dr. Tim Johnson said that "it all comes down to calories", again missing the fact that people naturally cut down on calories when cutting carbs without being hungry.

I'll be bringing you more details of the study and critiquing the media response, so stay tuned!

Image © Karen Struthers

Related Resources:

• Atkins Wins 4-Way Food Fight (March 2007)
  
  
• Low-Carb Eaters Eat Lots of Veggies, and Less Bacon than Assumed
  
  
• Long-Term Study Shows Safety of Low-Carb Diets