Atkins Diet Doesn't Beat Low-Fat Diets After a Year, Study Says
Sept. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Low-carbohydrate diets such as the one popularized by nutrition guru Robert Atkins lose their advantages over other diets within a year, a Lancet study said.

People who ate less of starchy foods such as potatoes lost more weight in six months than those who trimmed fat and calories, according to a review of three clinical trials by researchers from RVA University in Copenhagen. The differences disappeared a year after the diets began.

``In the long term, people start to regain weight,'' Arne Astrup, lead researcher and a professor of nutrition, said in an interview. ``After one year, there's hardly any differences between the Atkins groups and low-fat groups.''

People have bought more than 45 million copies of Atkins diet books in the past four decades, Astrup said in the Sept. 4 edition of the U.K. medical journal Lancet. Obesity is catching up with smoking as the leading cause of death in the U.S., where three in five adults are overweight or obese, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says. The condition raises the risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, some cancers, gall bladder disease and arthritis.

The popularity of low-carb diets has led food companies to develop products such as H.J. Heinz Co.'s One Carb Ketchup and General Mills Inc.'s Hamburger Helper Carb Monitor.

In the first 132-patient trial reviewed by the Danish researchers, severely obese people lost an average of 3.9 kilograms (8.6 pounds) more on a low-carb diet after six months, compared with those on a low-fat diet, though the gap closed after a year. Low-carb dieters lost 4.6 more kilograms than low- fat dieters in a second six-month study of 53 obese women.

The Atkins diet beat a reduced-calorie diet after six months in a third study of 63 people, who lost 7 percent of their body weight compared with 3.2 percent for the low-calorie dieters, with the difference no longer significant after a year, the researchers said. The Atkins diet allows liberal amounts of butter and high-fat meat and dairy products, while restricting carbohydrates to less than 30 grams a day.

Constipation, Headaches

Side effects experienced by those on carbohydrate-restricted diets in the studies included constipation, headaches, bad breath, diarrhea, muscle weakness and cramps. The brain and muscles need some carbohydrates to function properly, and avoiding grains, fruits and vegetables might raise the risk of heart disease and cancer, the review said.

``There's no available evidence that it's unsafe in the short term,'' Astrup said.

The low-carb plans cut blood fats called triglycerides and reduced some heart disease risks more than other diets, the analysis said. The greater weight loss by Atkins-style dieters may explain the difference, since weight loss reduces blood fats and other heart risks, the researchers said.

Studies lasting as much as two years are needed to investigate the long-term effects of the Atkins and other low- carbohydrate diets, the researchers said. They recommended limiting calories and fat and exercising to lose weight and reduce the risk of diabetes and heart disease.

About 1 billion people worldwide are overweight or obese, usually defined as more than 20 percent over their ideal weight, according to the World Health Organization.



To contact the reporter on this story:
Martiga Lohn in Berlin mlohn1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Mark Rohner at mrohner@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: September 2, 2004 19:01 EDT

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