Can Diets Cut Your Life Short?

Yes, According to a Study By Finnish Scientists. But Not All Nutritionists and Dieticians Agree With the Controversial Findings.

IN THE midst of an obesity crisis which costs the NHS an estimated pounds-500m a year, antidiet campaigners are barely heard. Adult obesity has nearly quadrupled in Britain in the past 25 years and nobody is hailing it as an improvement in quality of life. So, those who are anti-diet have a rough time when it comes to fighting for fat acceptance on aesthetic grounds.

After all, nobody would ever argue a case for other potentially fatal conditions being beautiful.

A new study, however, adds to mounting evidence that the antidieters may have some valid points.

The health of just fewer than 3000 people, who were screened to ensure they had no underlying illnesses, was studied over 25 years to see what physiological damage could be caused by weight loss. The study, which was carried out in Finland and led by Thorkild Sorensen of the Institute of Preventive Medicine at Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark, concluded that overweight people who dieted to reach a healthier weight were more likely to die young than those who remained fat.

It follows a large-scale US study reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1998, which highlighted the risks of fluctuating weight. It said that men and women whose weight see- sawed often or greatly over a period of many years had a significantly higher risk of death than those with stable, although very high, weight. At the time the National Centre for Eating Disorders questioned whether it was dieting associated with obesity rather than the obesity itself which contributes to the risk of ill health.

Where does all this leave the diet industry? At present it can use government guidelines on healthy target weights and information about the physical and psychological benefits of weight loss in order to sell its products.

Companies can even push nocarb, quick-fix diets that contradict government guidelines about eating a balanced diet and the quantities of food we should eat from each food group. The industry rakes in an estimated pounds-2bn in the UK alone and not just from the 21-per cent of the population who are obese. If public health messages change as a result of these new findings, the health claims of, for example, slimming clubs, may have to change with them.

WeightWatchers gives short shrift to the new study. Having spoken to the company's scientific advisers, a spokeswoman says that there is nothing they can learn from it.

"[Our registered dieticians] have been very honest and have considered the findings of this recent study and believe it to be of insufficient size and scale compared with the huge wealth of data showing the health benefits associated with even modest weight loss, " she says. "In view of this we won't be making any further comment."