Process for Sugar-Induced Fat Formation

Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas are one step closer to understanding how high carbohydrate diets lead to obesity and diabetes.

Dr. Kosaku Uyeda, professor of biochemistry, has shown that a single protein called carbohydrate response element binding protein (ChREBP), discovered by his research group, activates several genes that cause cells in the liver to turn sugar into fat.

Their work appears in two studies in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The first study, published in an earlier issue, is available online, and the second, also online, will appear in an upcoming issue of PNAS.

“Purifying ChREBP from rat livers took two postdoctoral fellows two years of very hard work,” said Dr. Uyeda, senior author of both studies and a research scientist at the Veterans Affairs North Texas Health Care System. “With the discovery of this factor, the biochemical mechanism of how carbohydrates are converted to fat has become clearer.”

Eating meals high in carbohydrates or sugars leads the body to do several things. Some of the sugars are immediately converted to energy while the rest of the sugars are converted to fat. The sugar-to-fat conversion occurs two ways – an immediate response, where enzymes are mobilized to rapidly convert sugars into fat; and a slower response, in which several different genes are turned on and off, creating more enzymes that can also turn sugar into fat. ChREBP is involved in the slow response...

Read full article: Newswise

At last, scientific proof that the Atkins diet works

From The Times, UK

By Nigel Hawkes, Health Editor
PEOPLE on the Atkins diet do lose weight quickly without damaging changes in their cholesterol levels, according to two new studies.

The results forced one leading nutritionist to admit that dieticians who had disparaged the Atkins diet for years could no longer dismiss low-carbohydrate diets. Walter Willett, of Harvard School of Public Health, added that the diet’s creator, the late Dr Robert Atkins, deserved credit for his observations.

The research is the latest dispatch in the diet wars between Atkins, who promoted a high-fat, meat-packed menu low in carbohydrates such as bread and potatoes, and the dietary establishment, which prefers low-fat diets.

Previously, most nutritionists have acknowledged that it is possible to lose weight on the Atkins diet but believed that it could have bad long-term health consequences.

The new studies go some way towards disproving that. But one also shows that calorie-counting low-fat diets work just as well if followed for a year, but are not as effective in the shorter term.

The Atkins Foundation helped to fund the research by Duke University Medical Centre in Durham, North Carolina but had no involvement in the work. In it, 120 obese adults between 18 and 65 were randomly allocated to an Atkins or to a low-fat diet.

After six months, the average weight loss on Atkins was 26lb, and on the low-fat diet 14lb, the team reports in Annals of Internal Medicine.

The Atkins dieters lost more body fat, had lowered levels of trigycerides (fats) in the bloodstream and raised levels of the “good” form of cholesterol — two changes that should enhance the health of their heart and circulation.

The results surprised the team. “This diet can be quite powerful” said Will Yancy. “The weight loss surprised me, to be honest with you. We also found that cholesterol levels seemed to improve more on a low-carb diet compared with a low-fat diet.” A second study — not funded by Atkins — in the same issue of the journal followed 132 obese adults, most suffering from diabetes, for 12 months. Half were assigned to an Atkins-like diet, half to a low-fat diet.

At the six-month point, the Atkins dieters had lost more weight, but then stabilised and the low-fat group began to catch up. By 12 months the low-carb dieters had lost 11lb-19lb, the low-fat dieters 7lb-19lb. But once again, blood changes favoured the Atkins dieters. Those with diabetes also controlled their blood sugar better on the Atkins diet.

Linda Stern, who led the study at the Veterans Affairs Medical Centre in Philadelphia, said: “A low-carbohydrate diet is a good choice because much of our overeating has to do with consumption of too many carbohydrates.”

Source: The Times, UK

High fat diet gives girl new life

From the BBC

A four-year-old Cornwall girl with a severe form of epilepsy is free from blackouts thanks to an 80% fat diet.

Sarah Laslett's diet includes cream, butter, nuts and eggs and is devised by Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital in London.

As Sarah burns off the fat her body produces ketones which protect the brain against seizures.

Sarah, from Morval near Looe, no longer suffers scores of blackouts and seizures every day.

The youngster has Myoclomic Astatic epilepsy, a rare, drug-resistant form of epilepsy that triggers scores of blackouts and seizures every day.

"Her exuberance is wonderful and she has been completely transformed"
--Teacher Sonia Barrett

The attacks started eight months ago and meant Sarah had to wear a helmet when she was playing.

Then her family found out about a trial at Great Ormond Street of the ketogenic diet.

The high fat, low carboydrate, low protein diet is so finely balanced it has to be carefully calculated by experts who are on hand for advice and support.

One of the key features is restrictions on high-sugar foods, breads, pasta, cereal and starchy vegetables.

Mealtimes are a well-practiced routine of measuring food to within a gramme.

Water regulated

For instance, breakfast could consist of 25 grammes of cream, mixed with water, 43 grammes of egg, mixed with another 25 grammes of cream and 15 grammes of butter, followed by 21 grammes of fruit.

Different types of fruit have different carbohydrate levels so that too has to be adjusted.

Sarah also drinks a carefully regulated 120 millilitres of water an hour, to keep her hydrated, but also to avoid constipation and kidney stones.

Teacher Sonia Barrett has been looking after her at school since she became ill last September.

It has been 24 days since Sarah's last blackout but she still wears a helmet to play outside - just in case the fits return.

*£25,000 raised*

Ms Barrett said: "Only four weeks ago she would just sit very still. There was no animation and she seemed very sleepy a lot of the time.

"Now she is full of life. Her exuberance is wonderful and she has been completely transformed."

Sarah's family has also raised £25,000 to continue a trial at the hospital for another year and help other children like Sarah.

Her mother Alex said: "It's brilliant because other children now hopefully will get the same chance that Sarah's had to do this diet.

"I couldn't believe how a diet could make such a dramatic difference but for Sarah, this has been a miracle."

Great Ormond Street is recruiting children with severe epilepsy for the trial, although patients will need a referral from their paediatric consultant.

'Bunless burger' heads for Britain

By Frances Booth | The Independent

11 April 2004

The late Dr Robert Atkins achieved fame and fortune with his revolutionary diet, selling 15 million books.

Now it seems he has redefined one of the world's most popular institutions: the McDonald's burger.

With millions of customers now sticking to the low-carbohydrate Atkins diet, McDonald's has announced the launch of the bun-free burger. The meal will be wrapped in lettuce leaves instead of bread, and come with a knife and fork.

A "bunless revolution" is now sweeping the United States, where McDonald's said last week it would offer burgers without buns in all 13,600 of its restaurants. The new-style burger will be offered for all beef, fish or chicken sandwiches sold in the US from next month.

And Britain could soon follow suit. Thanks to the endorsement of stars such as Renée Zelwegger and Geri Halliwell, more than three million Atkins books have been sold in Britain and Atkins-branded meals are now on offer in supermarkets.

McDonald's has been struggling with falling sales in Britain and has already tried to attract new customers by offering healthier options such as salads, Quorn sandwiches, organic semi-skimmed milk and fruit. The bunless burger could help turn its fortunes around.

A spokesman said: "We are a customer-led business, we listen to what our customers want. A bunless burger is something we would consider in the future if consumers wanted it."

Cereals don't deserve to be called food

By Marika Sboros

How healthy are your ready-to-eat breakfast cereals?

Manufacturers say their products are high in carbohydrates, low in fat, with added vitamins and minerals. Health benefits, they say, include high-energy boosts for peak mental and physical performance, weight loss, and reduced risk of heart disease.

Market leader Bokomo even advertises its Pro Nutro as "the most nutritious family cereal in South Africa" - a claim contested by competitors, but sanctioned by the Advertising Standards Authority.

But, medical specialists say if you eat the cereals at all, you'd be wise not to do so regularly, and you shouldn't let your children eat them everyday.

'You'd be wise not to do so regularly'
They say we are being hoodwinked into believing the cereals are a healthy way to start the day. It's a common perception with particular appeal for harassed parents with picky mouths to feed on the run.

Concerns focus on refined, processed, sugared, salted products, especially brightly coloured ones. Experts say the nature of the cereals - high-carb, low fat content - creates conditions for the development of health problems they are supposed to prevent.

One vocal cereal antagonist is Dr Sterna Franzsen, a Pretoria general practitioner and gynaecologist who practises complementary medicine calls the cereals, including "natural" muesli products, "rubbish" and "windkos". She says they don't deserve to be called food, so far removed are they from their natural state.

Dr John Briffa is another. He is a medical doctor and one of Britain's foremost nutritional experts. He says the cereals "peddle fodder as food". The notion that we should eat them every day is driven "by the food industry, not science and our experience".

Far from helping us to slim, refined cereals can actually make us fat, Briffa says. Their high-carb content stimulates the body to manufacture fat, and reduces its fat-burning potential. A high-carb diet may also lead to higher-than-ideal levels of the hormone insulin in the body, which can lead to high blood pressure, raised levels of unhealthy blood fats and increased risk of type 2 diabetes.

'The greatest scam in medicine's history'
Of course not all packaged cereals are equal, and some, such as 100 percent rolled oats (not instant), are less refined. But concerns make sense when you look at ingredient lists of ready-to-eat cereals, with sugar high up. Many start off with natural rice or corn, strip its nutritional value by refining and processing, and then claim to put back all the goodness by adding vitamins and minerals.

Is this purely to create demand and a longer shelf life? And what is the rationale justifying these products?

Kellogg's and Bokomo say it's not about shelf life, but about food safety, nutritional availability, variety and convenience. They say their products are based on sound nutritional science, that shows carbohydrates are essential, and the best source of energy.

Briffa and others say the cereals depend on myth, misinformation and ignorance about biochemistry and nutrition, and the power of vested interests. They depend on the lipid (fat) hypothesis, introduced by researchers to explain a disturbing increase in heart disease, cancer and obesity rates.

The hypothesis fingered cholesterol and saturated fats in animal foods such as butter, eggs and red meat as causing problems. Yet these were in the diet for years before the rising incidence of life-threatening diseases, says Briffa.

Researchers chose to ignore unusual changes in diets, especially the introduction of highly refined, processed carbohydrates, such as sugar, white bread, flour, pasta, and lifestyle habits of smoking and reduced physical activity.

Studies appeared to confirm the hypothesis, and doctors began to pronounce confidently that "it is convincingly clear that saturated animal fat is the dietary risk factor in raising cholesterol concentrations". Many still do so today.

The hypothesis spawned the notion that high-carb, low-fat foods promote health.

"They don't," says Briffa, "and the evidence is there for anyone willing to see it. "For instance, studies show that in the long-term, low-fat diets do not lead to weight loss. The totality of the evidence shows saturated fat is very unlikely to be the true villain of the health piece."

This is still disputed in medical circles. The South African Heart Foundation has moved from the low-fat stance, but still recommends decreasing fat and a good carb intake.

Others say the effects of the lipid hypothesis have been insidious. Amercican heart researcher Dr George Mann called it "the greatest scam in medicine's history", used to "convince millions of healthy people they are sick and need expensive drugs with serious side effects".

Briffa says we should look at the many traditional societies who eat high levels of animal food and saturated fat but remain free of heart disease. One of them is the Masai cattle-herding people in Africa who eat meat, blood and rich milk, yet their heart disease rates remain refreshingly low.

Eggs have had undeservedly bad press. Studies in rural communities show that high egg consumption does not increase heart disease risk.

The most likely cause is inactivity coupled with pervasive changes to our diets, says Briffa.

"Increasingly, we have been eating a diet denuded of much of its nutritional value, at the same time tainted with potentially hazardous components including trans-fatty acids, salt, refined sugar and artificial additives."

He says the healthiest diet is that of our ancestors which was varied, with flesh foods, fresh vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, and small amounts of unrefined carbs.

Our diets are too high in carbohydrates from grains, refined or unrefined, says Briffa. "Genetically, we are similar to our ancestors of 10 000 years ago, which means we are best adapted to the diet we ate before grains were used."

Today there is a lot of hype about high or low GI (glycaemic index) foods. The index rates the speed with which foods release their sugar content into the bloodstream.

"Cereal manufacturers have leapt on to the GI bandwagon," says Briffa. "They try to give the impression that their products have low GIs, but the reality is most cereals release sugar quickly."

Eaten in excess, refined carbohydrates may have "significant hazards for our health".

How cereal is made:

Kellogg's Corn Flakes:

A non-genetically modified variety of corn grown for about 180 days.

The hybrid corn is harvested, stored in silos and sorted at the mill.

The milling process includes cleaning. Only split kernel of a specific size is used, with a formula of malt flavour, salt and sugar.

Flavoured grits are funnelled into stainless-steel cookers. Heat-stable vitamins and iron are added. The grits are dried and put through rollers to form flakes.

The flakes are tumble-toasted in an oven.

Contents are weighed into moisture-resistant liners, sealed to form bags, and packed into sealed, date-coded cartons.

Sub-standard wet or dry waste is sold for animal feed. No food or ingredient is deliberately prepared for animal feed. - Source: Kellogg's

Source: http://www.iol.co.za

'Healthy' Diet May Increase Bad Cholesterol

Source: Yahoo

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - There is a plethora of evidence suggesting that low-fat diets, particularly those rich in fruits and vegetables are "healthy." However, in a small study of women, a diet low in fat and high in fruits and vegetables caused an increase in the plasma levels of oxidized LDL cholesterol, the "bad" cholesterol.

This finding was unexpected, Dr. Marja-Leena Silaste from the University of Oulu in Finland and colleagues write in Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis. and Vascular Biology: Journal of the American Heart Association (news - web sites).

To explore how alterations in diet affect LDL levels, researchers put 37 healthy women on two different diets. Both diets were low in total and saturated fat. One was low in vegetables and the other high in vegetables and fruits.

They discovered that blood levels of LDL increased by 27 percent in response to the low-fat, low-vegetable diet and 19 percent in response to the low-fat, high-vegetable diet. Both diets also produced small but significant decreases in HDL "good" cholesterol.

Silaste and colleagues think the "most likely reason" for the increase in LDL levels in response to the diets is the increase in a carrier protein called lipoprotein a.

This is certainly possible, Dr. Mohamad Navab and colleagues from the University of California, Los Angeles, write in an editorial, but there are other possibilities as well.

"Whatever the explanation, the findings by Silaste et al are sure to provide the basis for further exciting and potentially important studies," they write.

SOURCE: Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology, March 2004.

Put Fat Children on Atkins Diet

Overweight children should be put on Atkins-style diets to lose weight and prevent life-threatening diseases, a cancer specialist claimed today.

Professor Julian Peto, from the Institute of Cancer Research, believes high protein, low carbohydrate diets could be the solution to the country’s soaring obesity problem.

He told BBC Radio 5 Live: “We have a major obesity problem in this country. It is now overtaking smoking as the number one killer and I am very concerned that we need to tackle it early.

“Children especially need to be targeted. We should be weighing children in school regularly and we need to rethink dietary advice because the current advice clearly isn’t working.”

Full article: scotsman.com

The Diet-Heart Hypothesis: A Critique

Published in the American Journal of Cardiology:

Sylvan Lee Weinberg, MD, MACC
Dayton, Ohio

The low-fat "diet heart hypothesis" has been controversial for nearly 100 years. The low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet, promulgated vigorously by the National Cholesterol Education Program, National Institutes of Health, and American Heart Association since the Lipid Research Clinics-Primary Prevention Program in 1984, and earlier by the U.S. Department of Agriculture food pyramid, may well have played an unintended role in the current epidemics of obesity, lipid abnormalities, type II diabetes, and metabolic syndromes. This diet can no longer be defended by appeal to the authority of prestigious medical organizations or by rejecting clinical experience and a growing medical literature suggesting that the much-maligned low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet may have a salutary effect on the epidemics in question.
(J Am Coll Cardiol 2004;43:731-3) © 2004 by the American College of Cardiology Foundation

Download the full article (published with author's permission): The Diet-Heart Hypothesis - A Critique [.pdf file]

Is This Man Obese?

Source: B2DAY

"It's hard to believe Robert Atkins weighed 258 pounds when he died last April, as the Wall Street Journal contended Tuesday. Last February, just a couple of months before his death, I had dinner with the diet doctor at a French restaurant on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, and was most struck by how frail he seemed. He wasn't thin, but it was hard to see his physique exactly because it was the day after a big blizzard and he was wearing a thick sweater. Atkins ordered fish, went without bread or potatoes, and had cappuccino with cream. He did say something about wanting to take off a few pounds. But we're talking three, not 50. These photos were taken for our story on February 24, about two months before Atkins's April 17 death. Does he look as if he's 60 pounds overweight to you?"



[click to enlarge]

Steak Through the Heart?

By Neil Cavuto

I think it's time to update you on a few key facts on this Atkins situation.

Update 1: He's dead. He can't defend himself.

Update 2: His medical records were made public. How would you like that to happen to you, or a loved one?

Update 3: The people who revealed those records were a group called the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

Update 4: That group advocates vegetarianism and is among the Atkins diet's biggest critics.

Update 5: They seem to have an axe to grind.

Update 6: They seem to be selective when they grind that ax.

Update 7: Atkins was not, and I repeat was not, obese at the end of his life. According to a hospital record obtained by USA Today, the good doctor was all of 195 pounds when he was admitted to a hospital after a fall on April 8, 2003.

Update 8: He lapsed into a coma and died nine days later. No one, and I repeat no one, knows for sure how much weight he gained with water retention while he was comatose. But clearly, it wasn't the fault of a guy downing ring-dings. For god's sake, he was dying!

Update 9: Dr. Atkins had cardiomyopathy that resulted from a viral infection, not his diet.

Update 10: I had a chance to see Dr. Atkins several times over the last few years. He always seemed in pretty good shape to me. And why wouldn't he be? He was the face of a diet revolution for more than 40 years! You don't stay on message if you're not staying in shape. And Atkins did and was.

They say dead men tell no tales. I just pity the fact this dead man can't tell his critics where to get off.

Let them eat their vegetables. But for god's sake, let this man rest in peace.

Watch Neil Cavuto's Common Sense weekdays at 4 p.m. ET on Your World with Cavuto.

Source: foxnews.com

Veronica Atkins on Illegal Distribution Dr. Atkins' Medical Records

Press Release Source: Veronica Atkins

Statement by Veronica Atkins on the Illegal Distribution of Personal Medical Information Regarding Her Late Husband Dr. Robert C. Atkins

NEW YORK, Feb. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- I have always assumed that my husband's personal medical history is private and of no concern or relevance to the media or general public. Prior to today, I have not seen any reason to share Dr. Atkins' private information with the public. I am sure that any one of you would be offended and perhaps even horrified to have complete strangers intrude into your personal family matters, especially with regard to something as intimate as your medical records or those of your loved one.

It has now become clear to me that if I don't speak out, unscrupulous individuals will continue to twist and pervert the truth in an attempt to destroy the reputation and great work of my late husband. These individuals have gone so far as to obtain my husband's personal and confidential medical information from the New York City Medical Examiner's office for distribution to news organizations in direct and knowing violation of federal law. Obviously such people will have no trouble picking and choosing bits and pieces of fact and supposition to mislead the world.

But here is the truth: my husband's medical records have been reviewed by knowledgeable doctors and his medical condition discussed with cardiac specialists. It is clear that Dr. Atkins developed a condition called cardiomyopathy approximately three years prior to his death. It is also true that when Robert developed cardiomyopathy his coronary arteries showed only minimal and clinically insignificant signs of coronary artery disease, consistent with what would be expected in a 69-year old man. Cardiomyopathy is a serious and progressive condition and was, I have been told, in Robert's case, caused by a viral infection. Though this condition significantly weakened his heart, its cause was clearly related to an infection and not his diet.

All of this was well documented and openly discussed by Robert himself on national television. Additionally, as Dr. Atkins explained on Larry King Live and other public appearances, he did have a witnessed cardiac arrest in April of 2002. All accounts and records related to this event, and the insight of his treating cardiologist, are consistent with conditions arising from his cardiomyopathy, rather than a lack of blood flow. While Robert did have some progression of his coronary artery disease in the last three years of his life including some new blockage of a secondary artery that was remedied during this admission, he did not have a heart attack.

There is no evidence to suggest otherwise and for any physician to suggest so would be irresponsible, unethical and represent nothing more than an attempt to tarnish the reputation of a man who dedicated his life to solving one of medicines greatest challenges -- the obesity epidemic. Let me state emphatically that I have been assured by my husband's physicians that my husband's health problems late in life were completely unrelated to his diet or any diet.

It is also clear that my husband's death resulted from a serious head injury that occurred April 8th, 2003. Hospital records obviously and unequivocally detail the unfortunate clinical course that transpired following arrival of Emergency Medical Services through the entirety of hospitalization, confirming that after losing consciousness en route to the hospital, Robert's condition failed to improve despite emergency neurosurgical treatment for bleeding within his head. In life, Dr. Atkins was adamant about not wanting life support and when his wishes were honored, and ventilator life support was withdrawn on April 17th, he passed away as has been widely reported in the media.

But it has become clear to me that something as simple as the truth will be perverted and manipulated by dishonest individuals who will stop at nothing and will proceed without any regard for medical ethics or the previously private medical history of Dr. Atkins in an attempt not only to discredit my husband's work but to profit from his death. Work, I might add, that has been consistently and repeatedly vindicated by 18 independent scientific studies over these past three years. I now find myself in the uncomfortable position of having to relive his horrific accident and defend my late husband from people who would convince you that stolen and irrelevant bits and pieces of Dr. Atkins' medical history carry more validity than published scientifically controlled and peer reviewed research out of Harvard, Duke University, the American Heart Association and the National Institutes of Health.

It is for these reasons that I realized that I must put aside my grief and pain and speak out. Make no mistake about it, Dr. Atkins, at the end of life, was struggling with the effects of his cardiomyopathy and did not hide that fact. Despite repeated, often pathetic and now even illegal attempts by his most bizarre and extreme detractors to make the health of this 72 year old man THE central issue in the all important obesity debate raging in this country and around the world, it is not and never will be relevant. It is a sad and distracting sideshow, taking time away from an intelligent debate of the known science. We should all ask, is caring about what someone else eats so important that some doctors are willing to betray their most basic of oaths, to protect a patient's dignity and confidentiality? It is time to forget the myths and urban legends perpetuated by extremists like those who acted unethically in disclosing my husband's records and pay more attention to the real issues and all available peer reviewed science. I will do my utmost to put an end to this nonsense so that responsible physicians can focus on a debate rooted in fact and moderation and objectivity. We will not engage in espionage, tabloid journalism, or try to shout louder than these shameless individuals and I look forward to the day when Dr. Atkins' soul can rest in peace and I can grieve uninterrupted.

Source: Veronica Atkins
biz.yahoo.com

*FURTHER READING*

Press Release Source: Stuart Trager, M.D.

Statement by Stuart Trager, M.D., Chair, Atkins Physicians Council on February 10, 2004 Report on Dr. Atkins Weight at the Time of his Death

NEW YORK, Feb. 10 /PRNewswire/ -- Today's Wall Street Journal ran a story on the health of Dr. Robert Atkins and grossly distorted and inaccurately reported information that Dr. Atkins was obese at the time of his death. In fact, up until the time he became comatose and lay in the hospital for two weeks. Dr. Atkins' average weight was actually 60 pounds less than reported in the Journal. The newspaper article was based on incomplete personal medical records that were illegally delivered to the newspaper in violation of federal law, coming from a known group of Vegan and animal rights extremists.

Dr. Atkins' weight was consistently and frequently documented in the years and months prior to his fall; as he was suffering from cardiomyopathy, his health was monitored closely. Due to water retention, this robust 6-foot plus man, who competitively played tennis frequently during the week, had a weight that varied between 180 and 195. During his coma, as he deteriorated and his major organs failed, fluid retention and bloating dramatically distorted his body and left him at 258 pounds at the time of his death, a documented weight gain of over 60 pounds. How and why the Journal reported that he was obese, remains the only unanswered question in this pathetic situation.

Any implication that Dr. Atkins was obese or fat prior to his coma, shows a blatant disregard or even worse, lack of understanding of the medical facts surrounding this case, or of the physiology of severe heart failure and the degree of fluid retention that occurred during this hospitalization. None of us would expect the physicians at PCRM to reveal this in light of their past and their current motivation ... but surely as physicians they understood that this was not obesity, I guess it just didn't support the point they cared to convey ... so they chose to ignore it?

Source: Stuart Trager, M.D.
biz.yahoo.com

Why the Atkins backlash is just too difficult to swallow

From scotsman.com

As an Atkins dieter, or at least as someone who tries to limit my intake of bread, pasta, rice, cakes and biscuits, I’m used to scare stories. Almost every television programme or newspaper article on the subject tells me that the Atkins regime is bad. Last month the BBC reported that "doctors have expressed concern" that the Atkins diet - with its "high fat content" and "low vegetable intake" - could cause health problems. Just before Christmas I watched a documentary telling me that the Atkins diet was "against fruit and vegetables". People often ask me if I’m worried that I might give myself a heart attack.

Actually, I don’t think that avoiding chips, mashed potato, bagels, croissants and chocolate is likely to give me a heart attack. And if you read Dr Atkins’ New Diet Revolution you won’t see anything about avoiding green vegetables. But it comes as no surprise to see the media on the warpath again; this week, we are told, Atkins Nutritionals, the company behind the Atkins diet, has "changed tack", telling us that diets high in saturated fat can be risky. Can this be true? If you skim through this week’s papers, it seems as if even the Atkins organisation has become anti-Atkins.

However, it’s not true; the Atkins organisation has not changed tack. For a start, its diet is not just about eating bacon, sausages and steak. It’s about avoiding too much carbohydrate. Colette Heimowitz, director of research and education for Atkins Nutritionals, says: "The media and opponents of Atkins often sensationalise and simplify the diet as the all-the-steak-you-can-eat diet. This has never been true."

What is true, though, is that we are in the middle of an anti-Atkins backlash. People assume that, if it works, there must be something wrong with it. Atkins does work, for a very simple reason: carbohydrates, particularly refined carbohydrates, make you hungry. Think of a bread roll, or a helping of chips, as a line of cocaine. Eat some and soon you’ll want some more. Atkins says, "avoid the carbs". He does not say, "avoid the vegetables". Where you would normally eat chicken and chips with salad, on the Atkins diet you would replace the potatoes with a green vegetable such as spinach. And you’ll feel less hungry two hours later.

Why is the Atkins diet suddenly so popular? After all, low-carbohydrate diets have been around for ages. For one thing, Atkins feels contemporary; unlike most diets it’s not about being abstemious or counting calories. Men, who perform badly on most diets don’t mind Atkins. I keep meeting guys who say cutting carbs has changed their lives. My father, who could never eat small portions or count calories, lost three stone on Atkins.

It’s all to do with insulin. Carbohydrates tamper with the insulin in our bodies. They produce a lot of glucose, giving us a blood-sugar rush. But if you eat too many carbs your pancreas produces too much insulin; after a while, your blood-sugar rush will be followed swiftly by a blood-sugar crash. And low blood sugar produces cravings. This is what happens when you eat too many potatoes, or too much pasta or rice. It’s why Chinese meals leave people feeling hungry.

When I interviewed Dr Atkins last year, shortly before he died after slipping on a patch of ice outside his New York office, I was fat. I’m still overweight. But you should have seen me then. At slightly over 6ft tall, and 17 stone, I was fatter than I had ever been. My eating habits were getting more compulsive. I was hungry more or less all the time. I wanted to eat about six meals a day. Atkins told me that I was a typical victim of the Western diet. The problem with our culture, he said, was that we thought it was fat that was making us fat. But how could this be true? We’d been cutting our fat intake for 30 years and replacing it in our diet with "healthy" alternatives such as bread, potatoes, pasta and rice. And we’re fatter than we’ve ever been.

So I cut down on the carbs. I stopped being so hungry. Over the next year I lost more than two stone. And then the scare stories began. Too much fat, I kept reading, was going to kill me. But I wasn’t eating too much fat. Too much meat, I was told, would make me constipated. But it didn’t and I was also eating more green vegetables than ever - replacing potatoes and pasta with cabbage and broccoli. I was told that I would get bad breath if I ate no carbohydrates. But, in fact, I did eat small quantities of brown rice and wholegrain bread, which do not produce as much blood glucose as their refined equivalents, and my breath hasn’t suffered in the slightest.

Still, the backlash continues. I can see what’s happening. Food industry groups are worried that the Atkins diet will have an impact on jobs in their sectors. Potato consumption in Britain has reportedly fallen by four per cent since last year. And government bodies, such as the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, would rather die than say anything against bread or potatoes. This week, a spokesman from the Food Standards Agency told dieters not to cut any food group from their diet. "It is about maintaining a balance," he said.

And that’s true, too. It is about maintaining a balance. But why are we one of the fattest nations on Earth? I think it’s because our idea of balance was wrong in the first place. We ate too much carbohydrate. Now we’re eating less and people are getting worried. But that doesn’t mean you have to stuff yourself with sausages and bacon every day. In the end, it all comes down to something quite simple. Eat your greens. Drink plenty of water. And don’t worry so much.

\•DR ATKINS believed that carbohydrates over-stimulate insulin production, causing hunger and leading to weight gain. He favoured the consumption of eggs, bacon, meat, seafood and dairy products.

What you can eat

Large amounts of proteins: beef, lamb, pork, bacon, veal, chicken, turkey, fish, shellfish, eggs, plus fats - oils, butter and mayonnaise.

• Limited amounts of fats and vegetables deemed to have some carbohydrate qualities: dark green, leafy and non-starchy vegetables such as spinach and broccoli, cheese, olives, avocado, cream, lemon and lime juice.

What you can’t eat

All other carbohydrates - bread, pasta, vegetables such as potatoes, pulses, pastry, refined sugars, caffeinated drinks and alcohol.

Source: scotsman.com

From the Atkins Newsletter

Your friends at Atkins® encourage you to click on the link below to view Dr. Stuart Trager’s interview on "Good Morning America," which aired on January 20th. Dr. Trager explains that Atkins has not changed its position on fat and refutes the report printed in last Sunday's The New York Times.

View the video clip

Atkins Research Update

Press Release Source: Atkins Health & Medical Information Services

Atkins Health & Medical Information Services Research Update
Monday January 12, 9:03 am ET
Controlled carbohydrate research from around the world

NEW YORK, Jan. 12 /PRNewswire/ -- As an ongoing service from Atkins Health & Medical Information Services to practicing physicians and medical and lifestyle journalists, our communications department provides the latest developments in clinical research on controlled carbohydrate nutritional practices and the Atkins Nutritional Approach™ (ANA) as they occur and are reported. If you would like any further information or access to our complete library of published controlled carbohydrate research, please contact Gina Mangiaracina at gmangiaracina@wwafsp.com. You can also find the complete library of published studies in The Science Behind Atkins section at www.atkins.com.

Press Release Source: Atkins Health & Medical Information Services
ATKINS NUTRITIONAL APPROACH SHOWN TO REDUCE EPILEPTIC SEIZURES

Although the efficacy of a low-calorie ketogenic diet in treating epilepsy without medications is well documented in the literature, maintaining the level of caloric restriction necessary to produce the needed level of ketosis is challenging. Specifically, these results are typically obtained by mimicking the effects of starvation--restricting a patient to a high-fat, low carbohydrate, low-protein diet that provides only 75 percent of the recommended caloric intake. Researchers believe that this Spartan regime controls seizures by creating ketone bodies in the blood, which are burned by brain cells in the place of glucose. Though primarily prescribed for children, this diet may be beneficial to adult epileptics as well.

Eric H. Kosoff, M.D., of Johns Hopkins, wondered whether the Atkins Nutritional Approach™ (ANA), which achieves ketosis by less severe means- restricting carbohydrates but not caloric intake-might be as effective in reducing seizures in patients with epilepsy. To test this hypothesis, the researchers put six epileptic patients at the Johns Hopkins Hospital of Neurology on the ANA. The patients, who were equally divided between male and female and ranged in age from 7 to 52 years old, had previously failed treatment with anticonvulsants.

In half the cases, the patients' seizures appeared to be controlled by the ANA. Given the small size of this study and the relatively short duration of seizure freedom observed, the researchers have not yet recommended Atkins as a replacement for the usual ketogenic diet in the treatment of epilepsy, claiming that larger studies are clearly needed.

In the meantime, the researchers suggest that patients awaiting in-house treatment with ketogenic diets may be put on the ANA, which has the additional virtue of having "an easily readable and widely available paperback" to test their ability to comply with a low carbohydrate diet (compliance can easily be checked by testing for ketosis) and its possible effectiveness.

Kossoff, Eric H., Krauss, Gregory L., McGrogan, Jane R., Freedman, John M. Efficacy the Atkins diet as therapy for intractable epilepsy. Neurology. In press.

FAT INTAKE DOES NOT INCREASE SERUM MARKERS FOR
ATHEROSCLEROSIS WHEN STARCH IS RESTRICTED

In an earlier study, while testing a dietary approach to controlling diabetes involving the replacement of starches by saturated fats, James Hays, M.D., and his colleagues at Christiana Health Services, Inc. in Newark, Delaware, were struck by the fact that patients following this diet lost weight with no apparent adverse effects on serum lipids.

To shed additional light on these intriguing findings, and to clarify issues relating to "the changing mix" of medications patients were receiving, these researchers embarked on a second study to look specifically at the effect of their high-fat, starch-avoiding diet on serum risk factors for atherosclerosis in a group of obese patients with established atherosclerosis.

Preliminary results of a six-week study involving 17 men and six women were encouraging: On average, participants lost 5 percent of their total body weight with no adverse effects on serum lipids, in fact, showing decreased fasting glucose, insulin and triglyceride levels.

This is remarkable in light of what the researchers call the "overwhelming evidence" that the addition of saturated fat to an otherwise low-fat diet leads to increased serum markers of atherosclerosis. The diet Dr. Hays and his colleagues arrived at to treat patients with chronic diabetes and atherosclerosis is similar to the ANA with regard to restricting carbohydrate intake rather than fat consumption. In Hays' study, half the calories came from saturated fat and protein from red meat, cheese, eggs. Carbohydrates were severely restricted. However, participants were prescribed a consistent calorie intake, as this was favored for the management of diabetes. According to Dr. Hays, "We have prescribed a consistent intake of certain fruits and vegetables rather than the Atkins step-wise approach, and this may have resulted in some other differences." As a result, only five of the participants in the study went into ketosis, a metabolic shift considered key to appetite control and weight loss in the ANA. In light of this, caloric restriction likely explains the observed weight loss, in contrast to that seen with a typical Atkins approach.

According to the researchers, these studies "suggest, but by no means prove, that long term compliance with a high-saturated fat, starch avoidance diet can result in continued weight loss without adverse effects on serum lipid levels."

James H. Hays, MD, Angela DiSabatino, RN, MS, Robert T. Gorman, PhD, Simi Vincent, PhD, MD, Michael E. Stillabower, MD, Effect of a High Saturated Fat and No-Starch Diet on Serum Lipid Subfractions in Patients With Documented Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease, Mayo Clin Proc, November 2003, Vol 78, pages 1331-1336.

LOW-FAT DIET INFLAMES FATTY LIVER

One frequent consequence of obesity is a condition known as nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), the accumulation of fat in the liver. NAFLD is a serious disease, which can lead to fibrosis or cirrhosis. Common sense would suggest that lowering dietary fat might benefit those with NAFLD. However, a recent study done at Johns Hopkins shows that this supposition is wrong, and that a low-fat diet can exacerbate the condition, leading to increased liver inflammation, while high-fat diets seem to reduce the inflammation.

In a paper presented at the 54th Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, Jeanne M. Clark, M.D., described her study in which she examined liver biopsies taken from 74 morbidly obese patients undergoing surgery for their obesity. Before the surgery, the patients filled in a 24-hour food recall questionnaire, which allowed the researchers to estimate the total calories, carbohydrates and fats in the patients' diets. Of the patients biopsied, 89 percent had fatty livers, 69 percent had inflammation and 41 percent had progressed to fibrosis. Clark found that compared to those patients with the lowest carbohydrate intake, those who ate a high carbohydrate diet had a seven-fold increased risk of liver inflammation. By some mechanism that is still a mystery, a high-fat diet seems to shield the fatty liver from damage.

HIGH-FAT DIETS MAY BE EFFECTIVE IN MANAGEMENT OF TYPE 2 DIABETES

The importance of diet in the management of Type 2, or adult onset, diabetes is universally acknowledged. Exactly what this diet should consist of is somewhat more controversial. Recently, physicians have been prescribing diets high in monounsaturated fats with a restricted amount of starches. The reasoning behind such diets is that, since dietary starches act like sucrose, if monounsaturated fats are substituted for these starches, control of blood sugar would improve. Now, a group of researchers has taken this idea one step further by totally eliminating dietary starch from the diet in exchange for an unlimited amount of saturated fat. To the researchers' surprise, the extra consumption of dietary cholesterol and saturated fat did not increase serum lipids, and patients not only lost more weight, but blood sugar also was better controlled.

The study compared 151 patients on the no-starch, unrestricted saturated fat diet, and 132 control patients following a diet that allowed unrestricted monounsaturated fats and a controlled amount of starch. The study was not randomized, and the varying cocktails of drugs consumed by the patients made analysis difficult, which the researchers admit clouded their conclusion that substituting saturated fat for starch leads to better control of diabetes. Still, they conclude in their article that, "the stark differences between the high-saturated fat plus starch-avoidance diet and the diet currently recommended by the ADA [American Diabetes Association] are disturbing. Nevertheless, this information needs widespread critical appraisal, not because it conclusively proves the superiority of a dietary prescription so much as it provides reason to question the relatively recent dietary prescription of high-carbohydrate diets to patients with diabetes mellitus."

James H. Hays, Robert T. Gorman, K.M.M. Shakir, Results of the use of Metformin and replacement of starch with saturated fat in diets of patients with type 2 diabetes, Endocrine Practice, 8 (3), pages 177-183.

LOW GLYCEMIC INDEX MEALS SATE HUNGER IN ADOLESCENTS

Despite a general reduction in fat consumption, one in five children are overweight. One hypothesis about why this is so is that children today consume more high-glycemic foods that quickly raise blood glucose levels, than in the past. To determine the effect of high-glycemic diets on children, University of Utah researchers fed 10 adolescents (5 boys, 5 girls) meals with either high- or low-glycemic index.

As expected, blood glucose and insulin levels were much lower after eating the low-glycemic index meals. More intriguing, however, was that after consuming a low-glycemic index meal, the adolescents waited longer (3.9 versus 3.1 hours) before requesting additional food, though they then ate as much as after a high-glycemic meal. The researchers speculate that this prolonged period of satiety might reduce the daily caloric intake of adolescents on a low-glycemic index diet and lead to long-term weight control.

Ball SD, Keller KR, Moyer-Mileur LJ, Ding YW, Donaldson D, Jackson WD., Prolongation of satiety after low versus moderately high glycemic index meals in obese adolescents, Pediatrics. 2003 Mar;111(3):488-94.

LOW CARBOHYDRATE DIET HAS POSITIVE EFFECT ON BLOOD LIPIDS

To investigate the effects of very low carbohydrate diets on the blood lipids and other markers of cardiovascular disease in women, investigators attempted to repeat work previously completed on male subjects, using female subjects. This balanced, randomized two-period crossover study looked at numerous serum markers in 10 healthy women who consumed both a low fat (<30%) and a very low carbohydrate (<10%) diet for four weeks each. Although modest increases were noted in LDL, favorable effects on cardiovascular disease risk status occurred by virtue of a relatively larger increase in HDL and a decrease in fasting and postprandial triglyceride levels.

Volek, J.S., Sharman, M.J., and Gomez A.L., et al., "An Isoenergetic Very Low Carbohydrate Diet Improves Serum HDL Cholesterol and Triacylglycerol Concentrations, the Total Cholesterol to HDL Cholesterol Ratio and Postprandial Lipemic Responses Compared with a Low Fat Diet in Normal Weight, Normolipidemic Women," The Journal of Nutrition, 133(9), 2003, pages 2756- 2761.

STUDY SUGGESTS DIETARY FAT INTAKE HAS LITTLE EFFECT ON STROKE

In a result that has confounded the expectations of physicians and medical researchers, scientists at Northwestern University and Harvard have shown that the amount of fat a person consumes apparently has no effect on stroke risk.

Northwestern University's Ka He, M.D,. and his colleagues at Harvard monitored a group of almost 44,000 male health care professionals for 14 years. The men periodically mailed in detailed questionnaires about their diets, lifestyles and medical histories. Men who initially reported cardiovascular disease or diabetes mellitus were excluded from the study. After analyzing the results, the researchers found that the total amount of fat consumed had no appreciable effect on the incidence of ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke. Diets rich in animal fat, vegetable fat, saturated fat, monounsaturated fat or trans fat were all equally benign with respect to stroke. The consumption of red meat, high-fat dairy products, nuts or eggs also was not related to the incidence of stroke.

Ka He, Anwar Merchant, Eric B Rimm, Bernard A Rosner, Meir J Stampfer, Walter C Willett, Alberto Ascheri, Dietary fat intake and risk of stroke in male US healthcare professionals: 14 year prospective cohort study, British Medical Journal, 23, pages 777-780.

CORONARY ARTERY CALCIUM, DIABETES AND METABOLIC SYNDROME

The amount of calcium deposited in the coronary arteries is a strong predictor of future fatal cardiac events in apparently healthy individuals. It is also known that people with diabetes or the metabolic syndrome, also known as Syndrome X, have an increased risk of cardiac disease. But until now the relationship between diabetes, the metabolic syndrome and coronary artery calcium has not been studied.

The metabolic syndrome is closely related to insulin resistance, which makes it related to, and possibly a precursor of, diabetes. People suffering from the metabolic syndrome have at least three of the following health issues: obesity, low HDL cholesterol, high triglycerides, glucose intolerance and high blood pressure. Researchers at the University of California, Irvine, examined 1,823 patients, measuring their coronary artery calcium in addition to the various symptoms of metabolic syndrome and diabetes. They found that the more factors of the metabolic syndrome a patient had, the higher the coronary artery calcium. Similarly, diabetics also had an increase in coronary artery calcium, raising the need for further investigation as to the relationship between these findings and the risk of future cardiovascular events in the subset of individuals with metabolic syndrome or diabetes and coronary artery calcification.

Wong ND, Sciammarella MG, Polk D, Gallagher A, Miranda-Peats L, Whitcomb B, Hachamovitch R, Friedman JD, Hayes S, Berman DS., The metabolic syndrome, diabetes, and subclinical atherosclerosis assessed by coronary calcium, J Am Coll Cardiol. 2003 May 7;41(9):1547-53.

LOW CARB DIET EFFECTIVE IN SHORT-TERM TREATMENT OF OBESITY
IN SCHOOL-AGE CHILDREN

With childhood obesity reaching epidemic proportions, physicians everywhere are looking for treatments that are effective. Doctors at the Marshall University School of Medicine in Huntington, West Virginia. report that 23 percent of their pediatric patients are obese. In an effort to find an effective treatment for these patients, they performed a small study comparing a low-fat, calorie-counting diet to a low carbohydrate, calorie-unrestricted diet.

The study consisted of 70 obese children divided into two groups. One was given a low-fat, hypocaloric diet whose calories consisted of 55 percent carbohydrates, 15-20 percent protein and less than 30 percent fat. The other group was put on a diet without calorie restriction that kept the carbohydrates to about 7 percent of the daily caloric intake, protein at 49 percent and fat at 44 percent. The result was that of the 47 children who completed the study with a minimum of two months of follow up, those on the low carbohydrate diet lost an average of 6 kilograms, with a decrease in body mass index of 2.6 kg/m2 compared to those on the low-fat diet, who gained an average of 4.6 kilograms and whose BMI increase by .8 kg/m2. While this study was small and the error bars large, the result does suggest that the low carbohydrate diet is indeed an effective treatment for juvenile obesity.

Misty Trent Strow, James R. Bailes, Adrian R. McGinnis, Lewis Spangler, Jr and Isabel Pino, Successful Short Term Treatment of Obesity in School-Age Children, West Virginia Chapter American Academy of Pediatric Residents Research Contest Winner, 2001.

COMPLEX CARBOHYDRATES, THE BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS

Carbohydrates come in two basic varieties: sugars and starches. Sugars, also known as simple carbohydrates, are quickly absorbed by the body. Starches-complex carbohydrates-must first be broken down into simple carbohydrates before they are absorbed by the body. This difference can have an important effect on energy and appetite, as a recent study shows.

Researchers in the Netherlands fed 26 male subjects breakfasts high in simple carbohydrates one day and high in complex carbohydrates on the next. For the four hours following their meals, the researchers measured the subjects' blood glucose, insulin, triglycerides, free fatty acids and cholecystokinin levels. Following the simple carbohydrate breakfast, glucose and insulin levels were both higher at 30 minutes after feeding, triglyceride levels were higher at 180 minutes and free fatty acids were higher at 180 and 240 minutes. In addition, the subjects were asked to assess their satiety and levels of fatigue. The researchers found that those consuming a complex carbohydrate breakfast (whole grain breads and cereals) felt more energetic and less hungry than those who ate simple carbohydrates.

Pasman WJ, Blokdijk VM, Bertina FM, Hopman WP, Hendriks HF., Effect of two breakfasts, different in carbohydrate composition, on hunger and satiety and mood in healthy men, Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord. 2003 Jun;27(6):663-8.

Source: Atkins Health & Medical Information Services

Be Slim Without Dieting - Barry Groves Video out!

Your Perfect Weight Plan is a complete video guide to your slimmer, happier you. A 1 hour programme, packed with information and sample dishes to help you achieve Your Perfect Weight.

More information/order here: theperfectweight.com

A red-meat diet roams the earth once more

By Art Carey
Inquirer Columnist

In 1990, Jim Hays was a dietary hippie, a granola-gobbling, crypto-vegetarian disciple of Dean Ornish and his low-fat, high-carb cult.

Today, he is an out-of-the-closet carnivore, a meat-eating militant who advocates pigging out on plenty of fat and who regards sugar and starch as evil.

Nutritionally speaking, he has moved from Ralph Nader to Howard Dean to the right of Rush Limbaugh. Last month, he attended an Atkins convention and came away feeling betrayed.

"They've gone soft," he laments. "They're trying to be politically correct. They're peddling pre-packaged foods and permitting people to consume far too many carbs.

"I'm now more extreme than Dr. Atkins," Hays declares. "I totally believe the most important thing you can do for your overall health is to consume lots of saturated fat, particularly in the form of red meat."

Holy coronary thrombosis! Who is this guy? How did a nice boy from Kansas undergo such a radical transformation? Where did he get the nerve to contradict conventional wisdom and defy such pillars of the medical establishment as the American Diabetes Association and American Heart Association?

Hays, 48, is a physician who lives in Rosemont and practices in Wilmington. "Mild-mannered militant" may sound like an oxymoron, but it fits Hays. Soft-spoken and thoughtful, he backs his assertions with research and science.

At Christiana Care, the hospital and medical-research complex in Newark, Del., Hays has explored questions of diet and nutrition that have piqued his curiosity, challenged his assumptions, and resulted in published studies that have puzzled and provoked his colleagues.

His specialty is endocrinology, which is all about glands and hormones. Many of his patients are diabetic and dependent on insulin shots for survival. It was while trying to devise the best diabetic diet - one that would keep blood sugar low and help moderate blood-sugar spikes - that Hays made a discovery that upset the apple cart of orthodoxy.

Namely: Carbs are bad, fat is good.

In the early 1990s, Hays began shifting some of his obese patients from an Ornish-like diet to one similar to that recommended by Barry Sears of Zone Diet fame - high protein and moderate carb. Next, he began experimenting with an Atkins-like approach - high fat/high protein, extremely low carb.

The effect on his patients was amazing.

Not only did their blood sugar stabilize. Not only did they lose pounds and inches (though they weren't counting calories or exercising more). But their blood numbers also improved: total cholesterol, down; LDL cholesterol, down; triglycerides, way down. Hays was prepared to give some patients cholesterol-lowering meds; for most, it was unnecessary.

Since adopting a high-fat, low-carb diet, many of his overweight patients have shed 20 percent of their weight, and kept it off. Some have lost 100 pounds-plus, all while dining on fare that Hays describes as "a heart attack on a plate."

Consider what Hays eats when he's on the road. He'll stop at Mickey D's and order five double cheeseburgers. Then he throws away the buns and carefully scrapes off the ketchup (dastardly sugar!) and washes it all down with water.

At home, he eats only twice a day, and tries to consume 1 to 11/2 pounds of red meat per meal.

Why is fat so good? Besides making food taste better, Hays says, fat takes a while to digest, so it quells your stomach and suppresses appetite. Fat also prods your liver to make more bile, and bile is the garbage truck that hauls cholesterol out of the body.

Why are carbs so bad? First, they boost your blood sugar, which triggers a spurt of insulin. The more insulin in your blood, Hays says, the higher your risk of heart disease, and the more likely you are to be obese. Carbs stimulate the liver to make triglycerides, which lead to the nasty, sticky, artery-clogging kind of cholesterol.

Hallelujah! For years, I've been feeling guilty about all the "Grappler's Goulash" I ate as a high school wrestler. The recipe: Fry 3 pounds of ground beef. Pour off grease and sprinkle with a quarter-pound of shredded dried beef. Cover with eight to 10 slices of American cheese; when melted, mix until gooey. Salt to taste and smother with ketchup. Wash down with a half-gallon of whole milk.

"Sounds healthy to me," Hays said, "except the ketchup and milk."

The reason? Satanic sugar.

When it comes to sugar, Hays has zero tolerance. (You can't trust food labels, he gripes. Zero carbs doesn't always mean no carbs. The FDA allows wiggle room.) The only carbs he permits are those in fruits and vegetables offering essential nutrients. In his booklet, "Eat More Fat to Eat Fewer Calories," he calls sugary, starchy foods "candy," including baked beans, blueberries, beer, canned fruit, cereal, chili, cottage cheese, cream cheese, grapes, milk, oatmeal, pasta, pizza, rice and yogurt.

What about Spam?

"It's high fat," Hays said, "but like a lot of processed food, it contains sugar. People get into trouble, with both their weight and their heart, when they eat food that is both high in fat and high in sugar. A cheese omelet is OK. Spam and pancakes is a disaster."

"Body Language" appears Mondays in The Inquirer. Contact staff writer Art Carey at 215-854-4588 or acarey@phillynews.com. Contact Jim Hays at 302-633-1212 or welldrhays@aol.com.

Source: philly.com

UK food agonises over Atkins

Source: Telegraph

American food groups have gone low-carb crazy. So why arent British suppliers jumping on the bandwagon? Janet Bush reports

The craze for low carbohydrate eating, popularised by the Atkins diet, shows no sign of fading. But, as yet, the response of the British food industry has been resistance and even hostility. This is about to change. In an era of prohibitively tight margins, the Atkins market is growing too fast to ignore.

More than 3m Britons have bought the late Dr Robert Atkins' diet books. And research by the think-tank IGD finds that 23 per cent of women aged 25 to 33 are cutting down on the amount of carbohydrate they eat.

Those few retailers who sell low-carb products - many of them on the internet - report exponential demand. Joyce Edmonds runs Carblife Food. In July 2003, when the Atkins phenomenon was raging in the media, her website received 1.6m hits.

Richard Hunt, a butcher based in a farm shop near Stockport, has been making carb-free sausages for many years but was smart enough to label them as Atkins-friendly on his website, www.rickythebutcher.co.uk - sales are up 300 per cent over the past year.

However, both Edmonds and Hunt deride the failure of the British food industry to follow their lead. Edmonds has written repeatedly (without success) to the supermarket majors, urging them to meet the needs of the frustrated customers who visit her website.

She says: "It is a nightmare trying to source the products in this country. I have to import from the States - and that is so expensive for my customers. I have begged the supermarkets here to get their act together."

Hunt charges the food business with "trying to excise Atkins from the public's mind," because it has so much money tied up in highly profitable processed carbohydrates. "There is no margin in healthy food like eggs, fish and meat," he says. "They talk about balanced diets but they make their money from crisps, chocolates and sugar-laden ready meals. It's a huge con on the public."

The larger British food companies and the medical establishment seem united in their lack of of enthusiasm for low-carb. In the autumn of 2003, Dr Susan Jebb, the head of nutrition and health research at the Medical Research Council, dismissed high-fat, low-carbohydrate regimes as "a major health risk" and based on "pseudo-science".

Meanwhile, a typical food industry approach is that of Northern Foods - famous for supplying the supermarkets with ready-made meals - which says it has no plans to go low-carb and supports the Food Standards Agency's position on healthy eating through a balanced diet.

The major UK supermarket chains, none of whom cater specifically for the low-carb customer, routinely issue statements also extolling the virtues of a balanced diet and seem cagey when mention is made of Atkins.

The contrast with the US, where there are about 10m Atkins adherents, is stark. Barely a day goes by without a leading US food group launching a new low-carb product or rebranding its existing confections as in some sense Atkins friendly (KFC recently pulled a television advert which claimed its famous fried chicken was low-carb, after a complaint from the Center for Science in the Public Interest).

In America, low-carb products are offered in some 70,000 stores (and Home Bistro, an online retailer, will post you ready-made low-carb meals). Sales of low-carb products were an estimated $10bn (£5.65bn) last year, a 60 per cent rise from the previous year.

In an era of persistent obesity, figures from Mintel, the market researcher, show healthy sales growth for most weight control products. But Atkins Nutritionals - an offshoot of the Dr Atkins dietary clinic, whose sales are estimated at over $100m (£56.5m) - stands out with a 260 per cent rise between 2000 and 2002. Goldman Sachs and Parthenon Capital recently acquired a majority stake in this business for an estimated $700m.

So why are British retailers and food producers so wary of "Atkinising" their wares? Their caution seems odd, given the growing evidence that consumers are voting with their gullets.

Sales of wrapped and sliced bread have been falling, although John White, the director of the Federation of Bakers, says this is because of people switching to "premium" breads, not because bread is banned by Atkins.

Other losers from Atkins are more upfront about how worried they are. The National Potato Council (potatoes are an Atkins cardinal sin) launched a £1m campaign with the slogan "fab not fad" and held a British Potato to Work Week.

In an Atkins showdown, this coincided with British Egg Week (eggs are Atkins-friendly and sales have been rising by 4 per cent annually recently compared with the more usual 1 per cent growth). The National Fish Fryers' Association attacked the Atkins diet for undermining sales of fish and chips.

Jeffrey Hyman, the head of The Food and Drink Innovation Network, does not subscribe to the view that there is an industry conspiracy against Atkins.

He says that retailer caution is more likely to be based on the sheer cost of embracing new ranges and a genuine concern about whether the diet is healthy. "If we find some years down the line that low-carb dieting causes colon cancer, the supermarkets are going to look very silly indeed," he said. "But I still have no doubt that as soon as one of the majors gets into low carb, the others will follow in droves."

In fact, the British food majors are stealthily embracing Atkins. Heinz, which has launched 1-carb ketchup in the US, insists in its public statements that it has no plans to launch the same product in Britain. However, I understand that the product will be available here. And Heinz has just launched a low-carb version of its Smart Ones frozen meals because Atkins has undermined demand for its low-fat Weight Watchers brand.

As for Unilever, the UK's largest food group (which has admitted that sales of its Slimfast dieting brand have suffered because of Atkins), it has produced its own low-carb line in the US.

Among British supermarkets, the case of bashful Asda is intriguing. The subsidiary of the Wal-Mart colossus is stocking products from Atkins Nutritionals' new UK range in its in-house pharmacies from tomorrow, but did not wish to be cited at the Atkins British launch on December 17.

Wal-Mart is a major stockist of Atkins products in the US, so Asda's trailblazing is predictable. It is likely to expand from a small initial offering in its pharmacies to a broader range later this year.

Tesco is already stocking Michelob's "Ultra" low-carb beer. Although it says that it has no plans to stock a broader range of low-carb products, it has been talking to Atkins behind the scenes. Safeway says that it has no plans to stock "Atkins-specific diet products" but last month it added low-carb to its "less than" group of products.

Tamara Richardson, who is heading Atkins Nutritionals' UK launch (including shakes, bread mixes and breakfast bars), says the company will supply health stores initially - Asda's in-house pharmacies, Boots and Holland and Barrett among them - and only then move into supermarkets more broadly. This is the strategy it employed with spectacular success in the US.

This staged approach, she says, allows the company to "educate" the public about the science behind Atkins (actually, arming consumers against anti-Atkins propaganda) and build up production capacity. In the US, demand initially far outstripped the company's ability to roll out product and Atkins wants to avoid this problem in Britain.

Richardson is cautious about predicting the UK market's response: "It could be a slow burn; but we could see the phenomenal growth we experienced in the US," she says.

Either way, resistance from UK retailers is cracking and the bet must be that UK food producers will want to prevent Atkins building a long-term monopoly position in Britain. Unless they move fast and ambitiously with their own low-carb products, they may be too late.

Source: Telegraph

Spina bifida in babies is linked with cornflakes and white bread

By Robert Matthews, Science Correspondent
(Filed: 23/11/2003)

Pregnant women who eat sugary or highly processed food such as white bread and cornflakes face double the risk of having malformed babies, according to new research.

Scientists made the discovery after comparing the diets of mothers whose babies had so-called neural tube defects such as spina bifida with those of mothers with normal babies.

The study, involving almost 1,000 women, found that the risk of such birth defects was substantially greater among those who consumed higher levels of sugar and the highly refined carbohydrates found in potatoes, white bread and rice and many popular breakfast cereals.

University researchers at the California birth defects monitoring programme in Berkeley said such foods may double the risk of neural tube defects in unborn babies, increasing to a fourfold risk among mothers with obesity.

The new findings, reported in the latest issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, add to the growing concern over food products with a high glycemic index (GI). By producing a surge in blood sugar, the foods trigger the release of a large amount of insulin, high levels of which have already been implicated in birth defects.

Dr Ross Welch, a specialist in foetal medicine at Arrowe Park Hospital, Wirral, Cheshire, said: "Assuming these results have a sound statistical basis, then this is important. The question we have to ask is what do we do about it?" Most mothers did not realise the crucial importance of diet in the first days of pregnancy, Dr Welch said.

"High blood sugar levels have already been linked with foetal abnormality in diabetes, and this new research seems to be in line with that." He added: "Preconceptual folic acid is, however, still likely to be more important."

The findings come amid mounting evidence that high GI foods may pose a significant threat to health. Earlier this year, high GI diets were linked to 50 to 80 per cent increases in risk of oral and ovarian cancer by researchers at the Centre for Cancer Research in Aviano, Italy.

Most concern focuses on the role of such food in obesity. Research published earlier this month by scientists at Oxford Brookes University found that children given a high GI breakfast of cornflakes, Coco-Pops or white bread consumed many more calories at lunchtime than those given a low-GI alternative, such as bran flakes or porridge.

Professor Jeya Henry, who led the research, said that the results supported evidence that high-GI foods boost appetite while cutting satiety - the "full" feeling that normally follows a meal. Both are thought to play important roles in developing obesity.

"It is time we got away from the idea that it is all just a matter of a lack of self-control and exercise," said Prof Henry. "Every measure to reduce food intake must be explored. If we are serious about this issue, we need the Government and the food industry to get together to fund more research as a matter of urgency."

Within the scientific world there is mounting anger over what is being seen as foot-dragging by the food industry over its role in the increase in obesity, which according to official figures is responsible for 30,000 premature deaths a year in Britain.

Neville Rigby, the policy director of the London-based international obesity task force, said: "The food industry is the solution - they have to be, but they are not doing enough." However,the food industry insists that the issues involved are complex. A spokesman for Kellogg's, which makes many high GI cereals, said: "The science is relatively new and in some areas controversial. For instance, simply adding milk to cornflakes lowers their GI, while adding a banana lowers it even further.

"There is very clear evidence that foods such as Kellogg's Corn Flakes, which are high in carbohydrate and low in fat, play an important role in helping people reduce fat intakes, maintain weight levels and possibly help their bodies to better control blood sugar levels."

Parents with children suffering from spina bifida welcomed the research. Su Scurr, from Tiverton, Devon, whose three-year-old daughter Briony has spina bifida, said last night: "If these foods are a significant factor then women need to be made aware of this research. I wouldn't wish what happened to me on anyone. It was awful. We found out that I was carrying a child with spina bifida in a scan at about 22 weeks.

"I took folic acid in the two months before I got pregnant and I made sure I ate lots of fruit and salads but in the past I had eaten quite a bit of sugar. Who doesn't eat cereals? We need more research into spina bifida."

Mrs Scurr, a full-time mother, who lives with her husband Peter, a chiropodist, Briony and two other - healthy - children, said abortion was not an option. "I have no regrets. Briony is lovely."

Tanni Grey-Thompson OBE, who was born with spina bifida and has become Britain's best-known paralympic athlete, said last night: "These findings are interesting but you have to put them into context. Living in areas with heavy industry is also a factor, for example. It is really useful to encourage women to eat a better diet but there are also financial reasons why women eat what they do."

Ms Grey-Thompson, who has won 14 paralympic medals and eight medal placings in the London Marathon, added: "There are a huge number of scary things that women are told when they become pregnant that can put a lot of guilt on mothers. Sometimes disability is no one's fault and there is nothing you can do about it."

Source: telegraph.co.uk

Benefits of fewer carbs

Eating less of them may lower levels of bad cholesterol.

By Jane E. Allen, LA Times Staff Writer

Overweight people are constantly being advised to take off the pounds. Failing that (and they often do), they might improve their health by limiting carbohydrates. That simple dietary change can lower levels of a particularly bad form of cholesterol linked to heart disease.

A study of moderately overweight men found that even without cutting calories, the fewer carbohydrates they ate, the lower the blood levels of what's called "small, dense low-density lipoprotein."

Low-density lipoprotein cholesterol is known as bad cholesterol. Among many subtypes of LDL, however, small, dense LDL is considered especially damaging to arteries (it's more likely to get into the artery wall and trigger plaque buildup).

Having lots of small, dense LDL, low levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL or good cholesterol) and elevated triglycerides (another fat in the blood), is strongly linked to obesity, insulin resistance and diabetes and heart disease.

Dr. Ronald M. Krauss, director of atherosclerosis research at Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute, studied 178 men who were on the path to becoming obese and diabetic. One group followed a 55% carbohydrate diet, approximating what most Americans eat. A second group ate 40% carbohydrates. A third group slashed carb intake to 25%; half of this group ate a diet heavy in the saturated fats found in meats and dairy foods, while the other half was encouraged to eat more monounsaturated fats, such as olive oil.

The 40%-carb group experienced a significant benefit in reduced small, dense LDL, Krauss told colleagues two weeks ago at the American Heart Assn. Scientific Sessions in Orlando, Fla. Restricting carbs to 25% brought further improvement, regardless of whether patients ate saturated or monounsaturated fats.

Unlike the Atkins diet, which virtually eliminates carbs, the test subjects were given more realistic carb reductions. For three weeks, they were told to maintain their weight while limiting carbs. Then for five weeks, everyone cut 1,000 calories a day. All the men lost weight and reduced bad cholesterol, but those on the 25% carb diet already had gotten big reductions in the bad cholesterol before cutting calories. The others' cholesterol dropped once they cut calories.

Carolyn Berdanier, a University of Georgia nutritionist, said that carb reductions might not have the same effect on everyone because of genetic differences.

Source: latimes.com

High saturated fat, starch avoidance weight loss diet offers good preliminary results

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- In the quest for an effective weight loss diet that also is nutritionally complete, researchers in the November issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings report preliminary weight loss results of a regimen that is similar to the Atkins diet that are encouraging, but merit further, broader study.

Researchers from Cardiology Research at Christiana Care Health Services, Inc., in Newark, Del., report patients on a high saturated fat and avoidance of starch diet similar to the Atkins diet experienced 5 percent weight loss after six weeks without adverse effects. The Atkins diet is noted for its high-fat and carbohydrate restrictions, which have been shown to result in weight loss.

James Hays, M.D., of the Christiana Care Health Services, Inc. the primary investigator, said the study came about after researchers noted that patients with atherosclerosis or diabetes were also experiencing weight loss with a diet they were prescribing for treatment of the chronic disease.

"For the last eight years, we have been concentrating on dietary treatment of the chronic diseases diabetes and atherosclerosis and have ended up prescribing to patients a diet high in saturated fat much like what Dr. Atkins has advocated for weight loss," Dr. Hays says. "A consistent calorie intake is helpful in treatment of diabetes, so we have prescribed a consistent intake of certain fruits and vegetables rather than Dr. Atkins' step-wise approach and this may have resulted in some other differences."

Although further studies remain to be done, it might be possible to find an optimum diet that results in weight loss, promotes longevity and contains a lot of saturated fat, Dr. Hays said. The Atkins diet relies on ketosis, the decrease in appetite related to the caloric intake. However no long-term studies have determined whether there is a risk of cardiovascular disease.

Others who contributed to the study include Angela DiSabatino; Robert Gorman, Ph.D.; Simi Vincent, Ph.D., M.D.; and Michael Stillabower, M.D., all of Christiana Care Health Services.

The observational study looked at 17 men and six women who self-reported food intake and each lost 5 percent of their body weight in six weeks, Dr. Hays said. The diet prescribed for patients by the physicians was to consume one half of all calories as saturated fat, primarily as red meat and cheese. Eggs and other low-fat forms of protein were allowed, regardless of cholesterol content. Fresh fruit and non-starchy vegetables were prescribed in restricted amounts at each meal. Starch was forbidden.

In an editorial in the same issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Gerald Gau, M.D., of Mayo Clinic's Division of Cardiovascular Diseases and Internal Medicine, writes that researchers should keep an open mind about the Atkins diet and continue to study its metabolic effects.

With this published study, Dr. Gau notes that long-term follow-up and larger numbers of patients are needed for more definitive information. Dr. Gau writes that other diets that restrict calories should also be studied for their risks and benefits.

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Mayo Clinic Proceedings is a peer-reviewed and indexed general internal medicine journal, published for more than 75 years by Mayo Clinic, with a circulation of 130,000 nationally and internationally.

John Murphy
507-284-5005 (days)
507-284-2511 (evenings)
e-mail: newsbureau@mayo.edu

Source: EurekAlert

Diet for Obese Patient Tied to Liver Inflammation

"Compared with patients with the lowest carbohydrate intake, those on a high-carbohydrate diet had a seven-fold increased risk of liver inflammation. A high-fat diet appeared to be protective, with those in the highest fat intake group having a very low increased risk of inflammation."

Read full article: Reuters

Center for low-carbohydrate diet closes

NEW YORK (AP) _ The Atkins Center for Complementary Medicine has closed its doors, six months after low-carbohydrate diet guru Dr. Robert C. Atkins died at age 72.

The center was shuttered on Oct. 15, and patients were notified two weeks earlier.

Dr. Keith Berkowitz, a specialist in internal medicine and the center's acting director, announced Wednesday that he would open his own practice later this month that would continue Atkins's philosophy for good health.

Read full article: newsday.com

Low Carb Shifts Into High Gear

The Fairway supermarket in Plainview is bustling with shoppers on a recent Sunday afternoon. Smack in the middle of the sprawling store are displays of diet foods bulging with low-carbohydrate products of the most unlikely kinds: Bagels, bread mixes, cake mixes, candies, crackers, pancake syrups, salad dressings, cereals -- even chips and beer -- all seemingly forbidden foods for the growing legion of low-carb dieters.

In fact, by one count, there are now more than 800 products that mimic the very foods that dieters are supposed to avoid. Low-carb dieters, who until now have been content to stuff their gullets with steak and bacon and eggs, now can have their cake and avoid it, too...

Read full article: newsday.com

The burning question

Yet another study has shown that the Atkins Diet works, but even the scientist in charge is baffled as to why the low-carb regime rduces fat more effectively than low-calorie eating plans. Robert Matthews reports

As an academic nutritionist at the University of Cincinnati, Dr Bonnie Brehm is at the cutting edge of research into the biggest question to hit her field in decades: does the Atkins diet work?

Most nutritionists faced with the torrent of anecdotal evidence for its effectiveness have simply parroted the mantra that more research is needed, while muttering darkly about possible long-term health effects. Dr Brehm and her colleagues, in contrast, have spent the past few years actually doing the research, and will unveil their findings at the American Dietetic Association's annual meeting next week.

They have been studying the effectiveness of the Atkins diet in scientific trials involving people classed as clinically obese, implying a weight of more than 14.5 stone in a person 5ft 9in tall. Now the latest results are in - and it looks like vindication for the late Dr Robert Atkins, whose diet books have sold 15 million copies over 30 years.

According to Dr Brehm, those following Atkins's low-carbohydrate diet for four months achieved twice the weight loss of those on a conventional calorie-controlled, low-fat diet. Furthermore, the team found no evidence of harmful effects from following the diet - at least over the timescale of the study.

These results are in line with those found in similar small studies now starting to emerge. As well as backing the claims made for the Atkins diet, these latest results seem to further undermine standard nutritional advice about the need to focus on cutting fat and calories. They are certainly something of an embarrassment to Dr Brehm, whose research is funded by the American Heart Association, which has long advocated calorie-controlled, low-fat diets.

As a scientist, Dr Brehm puts unearthing the truth above pleasing her paymasters - but it is this that is causing her most concern. She is having problems explaining her findings - and in the increasingly vociferous debate over the Atkins diet, that may well land her in a lot of trouble at next week's meeting.

The scientific world is becoming increasingly polarised in its views over the diet, with researchers such as Dr Brehm being given a tough time over their apparent support for what some scientists believe is the nutritional equivalent of crystal therapy. At the heart of the controversy is the science behind the Atkins diet - first published 30 years ago - and whether it is really anything more than a collection of buzzwords.

Conventional wisdom dictates that calories are the key to weight loss, and so those who lose weight must simply be consuming fewer calories than they burn up. Yet according to Dr Brehm, the obese people who lost weight on the Atkins diet ate and burned up essentially the same number of calories as those on the standard diet. What was very different was the proportion of body fat s