Why Are Fad Diets So Popular?
With obesity predicted to affect more than 50 percent of the population in the next 40 years, the reign of ‘celebrity diets’ and ‘quick weight loss schemes’ has become more popular than ever before. From the apple cider diet to the Zone Diet to the Factor 5 diet, every single one of these weight loss fads all claim to help you lose weight fast and increase vitality.
But can they really help you to lose weight?
Sometimes… Apart from helping you to achieve immediate water weight loss of 1-2lbs, 90% of slimmer’s have reported little weight loss of just 1-3 pounds before plateauing after 2 weeks.
More disconcertingly, once dieters stopped following these fad diets they soon regained all the excess weight they originally lost.
What are the long term health risks of these fads?
There is a price to pay for the quick results of a faddy diet. For a start, whilst many of these celebrity fads can help dieters to witness fast weight loss, almost all of them cannot be used (safely) for over 2 weeks.
Depriving your body of essential nutrients needed to ensure your body is receive the energy they need to work properly, many involve reducing your calorie consumption to less than 1,000 calories a day- more than half your recommended intake.
Supported by extreme workouts and gruelling calorie checking, many of these said dietary fads do run the health risk of leaving you feeling quezy, tired, unable to focus and more worryingly stop you from functioning properly – All of which are bad for your health.
How can you spot a Fad diet?
Fad diets are easier to spot than you imagine. Offering you a immediate solution to your weight loss issues, you can often tell a fad diet by their:
- Too good to be true claims
- Lack of clinical trials
- Deletion of one or more of the five recommended food groups
- Recommendations from studies without reviews from other researchers.
