- WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- A
nutrition advocacy group warned on Thursday that the popular Atkins diet
may cause heart disease and could have killed a teen-age dieter.
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- It urged the U.S. government to monitor the high-fat
weight loss approach to see if it indeed causes heart disease.
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- The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine stressed
it could not prove the diet had hurt or killed anyone. But one dieter said
he believed the approach clogged his arteries and the parents of a teen-ager
who died while on the diet also blamed her meat-heavy regimen.
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- The PCRM called on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention to monitor diets and check for signs that the Atkins and
other high-fat, high-protein diets may be harming people's health.
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- "You can never say this diet caused this death,"
PCRM director Dr. Neal Barnard cautioned. He said the CDC should monitor
large groups over time to see if there was an association.
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- The CDC had no immediate comment. Two federal health
officials who asked not to be named said it might be possible to incorporate
the information into existing surveys on diet, lifestyle and health.
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- Atkins Nutritionals, Inc. said its diet was safe.
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- "There is no logic and no science to support any
association between these individuals and the ANA (Atkins Nutritional Approach),"
said Colette Heimowitz, vice president of education and research for the
company.
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- EAT MEAT
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- The Atkins diet has made headlines around the world with
an approach that flies in the face of most medical advice. It is based
on a theory developed by Dr. Robert Atkins, who died in April after a fall,
that carbohydrates make people fat.
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- It encourages dieters to shun bread, pasta, fruit and
many vegetables in favor of meat, butter and other fatty food.
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- "What I contend is that the Atkins diet gave me
heart disease," Jody Gorran, a 53-year-old Florida businessman, said
at a news conference organized by PCRM. He said his arteries clogged and
cholesterol shot up while on the diet.
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- Paul and Lisa Huskey of Columbia, Missouri, say their
16-year-old daughter, Rachel, died of a heart arrhythmia in 2000 while
on the diet. Dr. Paul Robinson, a pediatrician at the hospital where Rachel
died, said the diet could have caused her death by leaching calcium and
potassium from her body.
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- Many doctors and the American Heart Association have
warned that the diet could be dangerous. The Heart Association advocates
a diet based on whole grains, fruits and vegetables.
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- It warned that over time the Atkins diet and similar
approaches could raise cholesterol. Other experts have said the diet might
also increase the risk of kidney disease and the PCRM adds osteoporosis
and colon cancer to the list of risks.
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- The PCRM, which advocates a strict vegetarian diet, has
set up an online registry at www.atkinsdietalert.org for people to offer
complaints about the diet.
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- Doctors say anyone who loses weight will lower cholesterol
in the short term.
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- More than 60 percent of American adults ore overweight
or obese so the need for effective diets is clear.
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- "The skinniest people on the planet are vegetarians
and Asians," Barnard said.
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- http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=healthNews&storyID=3865668
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