Sweden goes low carb!

[Benay]

Jimmy More's Living La Vida Low Carb blog this morning is very exciting. Sweden's equivalent of the USDA has validated the low carb diet as based upon scientific evidence saying it is a healthy diet.

The news has exploded in Sweden. Low carb books are on the best seller list. A margerine company that advertised itself as "heart healthy" has been dumped by the Swedish equivalent of the Heart and Lung association as advertising without foundation.

This is huge! I am so thrilled! I hope that somehow this news gets to our national news stations and inspires a lot of talk before our new USDA panel comes out with another high carb food pyramid again.

Great blog containing a lot of interesting links.

[Benay]

Sorry, I forgot to include the link to Jimmy's blog for today.

http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/

[gitfiddle]

How exciting! I'll check it out. I haven't been following Jimmie lately.

[James L]

The National Board of Health and Welfare (equivalent to our FDA, USDA, or Surgeon General’s office) publicly declared on January 16, 2008 that a low-carb diet is “in accordance with science and well-tried experience for reducing obesity and Type 2 diabetes.” [Emphasis added]Interesting blog post; thanks for the link.

Question #1: What Swedish organizations are the equivalent of the US associations of physicians (AMA) and of dietitians?

Q#2: What opinion did those Swedish organizations, of physicians and of dietitians, have on low-carb diets before 1/16/08? And what is their position on low-carb diets today, over a year later?

Thanks in advance for any answers or information that anyone can provide.

[Roadstr]

"Swedish triathlon world champion Jonas Colting eats low-carb"... yeh, right?
I wonder how often Jonas trains for those "longer" races!
From Jonas Colting on carbohydrate bluff (http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=sv&u=http://www.kostdoktorn.se/jonas-colting-om-kolhydratsbluffen&ei=9GanSeCVNdW5tweqwZnwDw&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3DJonas%2BColting%2Bom%2B%25E2%2580%259 Ckolhydratsbluffen%25E2%2580%259D%26hl%3Den%26clie nt%3Dsafari%26rls%3Den)
"Sugar and refined carbohydrates have a role in longer races when you use the best of both worlds with fettförbränning and carbohydrate turnover. This is called "train low-race high"...

[Benay]

James L, if you go to Jimmy's blog you will find a link within the post to a Swedish low carb blogger. Ask him your questions about the Swedish health care system.

[Roadstr]

Always nice to have a shirtless ripped body of someone advocating low carbing, nice to have an athlete that trains really hard talking down the benefits of carbing up or carb loading... what's not so great is that he says he eats foods with a high sugar content and a balanced diet of healthy foods.

Jonas answers on http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/?p=3799
and admits eating a balanced diet most of the time. It's interesting to note the time of his post and the time of my last post in this thread... just coincidence I guess.

Jonas Colting, on February 26th, 2009 at 1:58 pm Said:
Craig,
you need to put that in context of the event of the Ultraman.
It presents physical strains 99.9% of the population will never face and during any kind of event like this, the first priority is to promote digestion.
Also, as this is an extremely hot and humid event the carbs loads the body on fluids as one gram om carb binds four grams of water.
So although I did consume some fast and generally unhealthy carbs I also ate healthy foods and furthermore spent the hundreds and hundreds of days prior to the event maximizing metabolism and health through training and a balanced diet.
I´m not a die-hard low-carb person in every stretch but rather believe in the “train low-race high” concept which includes more carbs during ardous endurance events. None of the negative side effects of excess insulin etc will then occur.
Jonas

Here is the link (http://www.slowtwitch.com/Interview/Jonas_Colting_and_the_Soul_of_Ultraman_Hawaii_141. html) to what Jonas says about his diet...

"Between stages I ate non-stop; Recovery drinks, rice pudding, bananas, Clif-bars, candy, chips, water, cookies and some normal meals like Thai food after the first day and fresh fish and mashed potatoes after day 2. My appetite was great all through out and I didn’t have any of that bloating that sometimes occurs during massive physical activity. Except for on the bike during the first day, but I know why that happened.

Now after the race I’m so sick of anything sweet that I’m "de-toxing" myself, just trying to balance things out with some fresh foods and getting back into a natural way of eating."

[maxlharris]

Also note, this is the Swedish health system, not the Swedish food system. There is something of a governmental territory fight between their equivalent of the USDA and their NIH.

[James L]

James L, if you go to Jimmy's blog you will find a link within the post to a Swedish low carb blogger. Ask him your questions about the Swedish health care system.
Thanks for your suggestion.