Cape Town - Tim Noakes’s diet has been partially been supported by a new study in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Financed by the National Institutes of Health, the study was conducted among 148 men and women without clinical cardiovascular disease and diabetes and from a number of racial groups.
The study examined the effects of a low-carbohydrate diet compared to a low-fat diet on body weight and cardiovascular risk factors.
After 12 months, participants on the low-carb diet had greater decreases in weight and fat mass and greater increases in HDL cholesterol level than those on the low-fat diet.
Those on the low-carb diet also lost about 3.6kg more on average.
Noakes’s Banting diet supports low-carb, high-fat eating, and is targetted at people who are insulin resistant.
“This is now the 24th such study showing these outcomes. The other 23 have been ignored but it seems this one might not be so easy to ignore,” Noakes said.
Last month, UCT professors sent a letter to the Cape Times slamming the sports scientist for making “outrageous, unproven claims about disease prevention” in advocating a high-fat, low-carb diet and accused him of promoting his diet without scientific evidence.
Asked for comment following the new study, UCT Faculty of Health Sciences spokeswoman Linda Rhoda said the professors were working on a response.
Cape Times