Gary Foster: "Like every diet book, this one suffers from hyperbole about quick and long-term weight loss. It overstates the virtue of fat and the evil of carbohydrate."


Keith Ayoob... more: "People do lose weight on this plan, but that doesn't make it optimal. Some examples of same-old, same-old: Skim milk is still bad, heavy cream is still good. Bananas and apples are still bad. If you want to eat whole-grain bread, can't live without a baked potato, don't want to limit yourself to a quarter-cup of strawberries and don't see anything wrong with eating a whole apple, this isn't the diet for you. Instead, try the DASH diet (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension). It's awesome, high in volume, super healthy, and it has got proven health results. And it's a good way of eating for the whole family. I wouldn't put kids on the Atkins diet."

Gary Foster... more: "Nonetheless there are nearly a dozen randomized controlled trials of obese people trying to lose weight that show those on a low-carb diet do as well or better in the short and long term as people on conventional low-fat, low-calorie diets. Surprisingly, a low-carb diet is associated with favorable improvements in some heart disease risk factors. The research shows that many of the original concerns about the Atkins diet's impact on LDL (bad) cholesterol and rapid regain were not realized. If you tell people to count carbs, they end up eating fewer or equal calories than if you tell them to count calories, but at the end of the day, it is still about calories. The low-carb diet is just a way to wrap your mind around eating less."

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