But that is the problem, it's not the whole medical community that doesn't agree with it. There are some that do and some that don't. And a lot of those who disagree may or may not have other agenda's then the well being of the people. For instance the American Heart people have been saying left and right what it takes to avoid heart disease, and everything about Atkins is against what they have said. Even though the short term studies have shown that BP and cholesterol levels go down. And nobody (until recently anyways) have been willing to fund or do long term studies.

There is a lot of mis-information being spewed about Atkins, and I have to question why. Such as that piece of the article I quoted, it's not hard to find out everything about the diet itself, yet it always get's represented as some diet where all you eat is red meat, butter, bacon, eggs and cheese. That is not the whole story, it's only one VERY small piece of it that is very temporary.

And what do those big institutions stand to lose after flat out saying how bad the diet is if it is proven to be not the big devil/killer that they claim. They stand to lose a lot, including financially as well.

Quite true, and maybe it will play out that way, I have a hard time believing that after some 30+ years. The definition of "fad" is something that takes up great enthusiasm for a short period of time. That obviously isn't the case here. If this thing were so serious and so dangerous we would have more than anectdotal type stories about this or that. If it didn't work in the long term it wouldn't stick around so long, etc. That's relative common sense, no?

For me personally, I have a few more months of low carb eating then it's on to the lifetime part of the plan which is almost identical to the zone diet, or a WW diet, etc (which are all just balanced diets, watching what you eat). But I'm still curious as to what the long term studies will find.

Andrew