Vegan diets "could help people lose close to a pound a week"

According to one study, following a vegan diet could help people lose almost a pound a week and reduce their risk of diabetes.

People who adopted a plant-based and high-carbohydrate diet lost an average of 13 pounds in just four months.

Scientists have suggested that changes to bacteria living in the intestine may have helped to improve the digestive health of the population.

And they said that the diet could make their body more able to absorb sugar from food, thus reducing the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Of the 148 participants in a study, 73 of them had to switch to a low-fat vegan diet and they all lost weight, while improving their body's ability to absorb sugar from their bloodstream ( stock image of vegan foods)

Scientists from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in Washington DC tested the effects of a vegan diet on a group of 148 people.

Some 73 of them had to go on a diet without meat or dairy products for 16 weeks and undergo tests to measure their weight, body fat, intestinal bacteria and insulin sensitivity. .

The other 75 did not make any changes to their diet but underwent the same tests.

All of the vegan participants lost weight during the study, losing almost one stone on average, with the largest weight losing 6.9 kg (15.2 lbs) and the lowest 4.7 kg (10 lbs). , 3 lbs).

Most of the weight loss was caused by the burn fat and their sensitivity to insulin has "increased significantly".

Being more sensitive to insulin, the body absorbs sugar in food more effectively, reducing the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Experts who commented on the study said it was encouraging, but the details of what people were actually eating and how it affected their bodies were meager.

"It's true that many foods in a balanced vegan diet are good for us, but that does not mean that all vegan diets are healthy," said Emma Elvin of Diabetes UK.

"Some" vegan friendly "products may contain added salt, free sugar or saturated fats. We should have less as part of a healthy and balanced diet.

"That being said, evidence to date has shown that some foods in herbal diets – such as fruits, vegetables and whole grains – were associated with reduced risk of type 2 diabetes.

"We also know that losing weight if you are overweight or obese can reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes in the future."

In a summary of their paper published in anticipation of the annual meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes, scientists also gave an overview of the bacterial changes in the guts of the participants.

They discovered that when people were losing weight, there was an increase in levels of a "good bacterium" called Faecalibacterium prausnitzii and that vegans had an "abundance".

F. prausnitzii is thought to strengthen the immune system and its low level may be related to obesity and Crohn's disease.

However, Professor Tom Sanders of King's College London said that this study could not directly link bacterial changes to weight loss.

He said, "The diet used was a low fat vegan diet, while typical vegan diets typically contain 30 to 35% energy from fat. Weight loss was important and should improve the sensitivity to insulin.

& # 39; However, it is not possible to attribute these changes to a change in the intestinal microbial flora (these are already well known for changing vegan diet, so this is not a new discovery).

"However, this shows that a low-calorie high carbohydrate diet (presumably unrefined) is beneficial for diabetics, which is contrary to the public's misperception that a high carbohydrate diet increases the risk of diabetes."

Dr. Ian Johnson, of the Norwich Quadram Institute, added, "What we certainly can not infer without further research, is that changes in intestinal bacteria have resulted in weight loss or an improvement in the metabolic health.

"Without further information, mere correlations can not prove causality."