Crazy Diets May Up Obesity

This week the president of the British Society of Gastroenterology, Professor Chris Hawkey, announced at a conference that fad diets—specifically those diets that exclude or emphasize particular foods—are leading to obesity among Brits. He went on to say that if Britons continue to engage with unhealthy fad diets the way they currently are, by 2050 nine out of 10 people in England will be obese. “Despite the popularity of fad diets, we are losing a grip on the fight with obesity,” Hawkey said. “We need to do away with quirky diets and get people to realize what will keep them healthy in the long run.” Some of the diets that Hawkey is critical of include rawism (only eating uncooked food); the Hallelujah diet (only eating fruits and seeds mentioned in Genesis 1:29); the Hollywood Grapefruit diet (which claims that grapefruit contains an enzyme that burns fat); and the low-carb Atkins diet.