vitriolic? maybe. uneducated..no. i am a 2nd year med student if you wanna go there. hey, since you are so keen on the facts.. lets examine a few, shall we?
the National Academy of Sciences, the most prestigious scientific body in the United States, agrees with the AMA and the ADA in opposing the Atkins Diet. So does the American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association and the Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins and the American Kidney Fund and the American College of Sports Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.
In fact there does not seem to be a single major governmental or nonprofit medical, nutrition, or science-based organization in the world that supports the Atkins Diet. As a 2004 medical journal review concluded, the Atkins Diet "runs counter to all the current evidence-based dietary recommendations."
Because of the Henry VIII-style meat load, essentially every single study on low carb diets that measured uric acid levels showed that uric acid levels rose. In virtually every instance it's been studied over the last 50 years, uric acid itself has been tied to cardiovascular disease risk, and may be an independent risk factor by increasing free radical damage or making the blood more susceptible to clotting.
When cutting calories, it's especially important to eat nutrient-dense diets, but the Atkins Diet presents a double whammy; it restricts the healthiest foods, like fruit, and unrestricts some of the unhealthiest, like meat. Shortly after Atkins' original book was published, the highly prestigious Medical Letter on Drugs and Therapeutics concluded that the Atkins Diet was "unbalanced, unsound and unsafe." As noted in a Medical Times review, Atkins has created a "ridiculously unbalanced and unsound" "hazardous" diet. Twenty-seven years later the Medical Letter offered an update noting that the safety of the Atkins Diet had still "not been established."
Low carbohydrate diets like Atkins maximize the consumption of disease-promoting substances like the cholesterol, saturated fat, and industrial pollutants in meat, yet restrict one's intake of fiber and literally thousands of antioxidants and phytochemicals found exclusively in the plant kingdom (like the carotenoids, lycopenes, bioflavenoids, phytic acid, indoles, isothiocyanates, etc.) that have "anti-aging, anti-cancer and anti-heart disease properties." As a 2004 medical review concluded, the Atkins Diet is so "seriously deficient" in nutrition that "there is real danger of malnutrition in the long term."
Where might then one get one's vitamins on the Atkins Diet? From the Atkins website, of course, on sale now for just over $640 a year.Add some antioxidants and the tab is up to $1000. That is, of course, in addition to the estimated $400-$1400 the pricey Atkins food--meat and cheese--costs every month (unless one chooses to live off hot dogs).
The Atkins Diet restricts foods that prevent disease and encourages foods that promote disease. No matter what Atkins or other diet books tell people, the balance of evidence clearly shows that the intake of saturated animal fat is associated with increased risk of cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. For over 40 years, medical reviews have also shown the detrimental impact of dietary cholesterol consumption. Even independent of the effects on obesity, meat consumption itself has been related to an increased risk of coronary heart disease.
Ketosis is also proven to be damaging to fetal brain tissue in pregnant women, Atkins acknowledged this only after his book had said the opposite, yet was it changed? no.
Well, I stand by what i said before, read something other than Atkins propaganda.. you might be suprised. I apologize for coming across too brash, you are entitled to your uneducated opinion.
Have yourself a great low-carb day!