Accusation 5:

AtkinsFacts.org Left Out “Crucial Information”

A number of objectionable statements appear on the AtkinsFacts.org website regarding Atkins…

  • The site contains numerous distortions of information culled from cited sources. These distortions are inaccurate and extremely irresponsible. For example, you refer to a study that suggests that a quarter pound of beef raises insulin levels in diabetics as much as a pound of straight sugar (page 6). However, you fail to state whether this was in a controlled setting, where a load of the food was given under fasting conditions, or in a mixed diet setting. Leaving out this crucial information allows the data to be misinterpreted and misused for the purpose of supporting your argument.

That study did indeed find that a quarter pound of beef raises insulin levels in diabetics as much as a pound of straight sugar. If anything, the experimental details we omitted (study subjects served as their own controls and the food challenges were given under fasting conditions) just strengthens the argument against Atkins claims which, as documented in the Faulty Science section of the website, one leading obesity researcher described as “the most unutterable nonsense I ever saw in my life.”[840]