http://www.telegraph.co.uk/wellbeing/diet/52-author-michael-mosley-im-proof-low-fat-diets-dont-work/
Rather than start on medication I invented a diet (the 5:2 diet), lost weight (10 kgs) and reversed my diabetes. Both my weight and my blood sugars have remained normal ever since. To keep them there I have taken up mindfulness (it reduces stress), I’ve become more active and, most of all, I have completely changed what I eat. First I cut down the sugary stuff, then I cut right back on the starchy stuff, like pasta, rice and potatoes. I eat far more oily fish and oily nuts (such as almonds and walnuts), more grains (particularly the super-trendy quinoa) and have even taken to spiralising courgettes as a substitute for spaghetti. I cook with olive oil, eat full-fat yoghurt, snack on cheese and have switched back to butter. Eggs are a big part of my diet.
The reason, I believe, why this is a healthier diet than a low-fat one is because it keeps my insulin levels down. When you eat a lot of sugary foods or easily digestible carbs (like rice or pasta) your body has to produce lots of insulin to suppress the rapid increase in your blood sugar levels. Eating fat or protein doesn’t have anything like the same effect on your blood sugars, and therefore your insulin levels. Because insulin is also a fat promoting hormone, advising people to eat lots of starchy foods (which is still standard dietary advice) is likely to make them fatter, not slimmer.
My wife, who is a GP, has recently begun offering her overweight and diabetic patients similar advice with spectacular results. They not only rapidly lose many centimetres off the waist but are soon able to reduce, even come off, all medication. Unfortunately, partly because of the long shadow of Atkins (which required far more radical dietary changes) this sort of approach is still frowned on. In fact, if you go on the NHS Eatwell website, it still recommends basing meals around starchy foods and choosing low-fat dairy options. I’m not suggesting we should all start to glug down cream or gorge on stilton. What I do think is that the NHS and other official bodies need to urgently rethink their standard advice.