Yeah, right. I'm not going to try to do so with this study, but in the last anti-low carb diet study a few days or weeks ago, I did looked into the fine print and found(surprise, surprise) that the low carb group had significantly higher rates of smoking AND diabetes at the start of the study. Now, the differences in death rates were, if anything, lower than what would be expected for folks with diabetes AND smokers. Which raises the question: why would you even do a study where the 2 groups differ so much? Could it be because you were hoping for a certain outcome? Maybe.
And of course, this raises another important question that is so often not asked in studies like this(I've seen it happen with vitamin D studies that showed U shaped curves): i.e., why were these people eating low carb in the first place? I mean, who gives up pie and ice cream and pasta , bread, potatoes, and sweet tea etc unless they have a strong motivation? Like, maybe they are fat or sick or both? Maybe they do so in desperation as their injected insulin requirements just keep on increasing as they eat their medically recommended low fat, high carb diets? Well, that would certainly be one reason!
But if so, don't people with the sorts of problems that often lead to low carb eating tend to die earlier? Have they adjusted for all of that? I doubt it, and even if they have tried my guess is that adjustments can be tricky. They claimed to have adjusted in that other study I mentioned. But, since they death rate differences were smaller than would be expected anyway for diabetic smokers, I'm not at all certain they did a really great job of making those adjustments. It seems tricky to me, but maybe they are brainy enough to pull it off? Maybe.
But, I can(and have) provided us with
RCTs that show the clear superiority of getting people off of their diabetes meds with low carb diets, as well as dramatically improving almost all of their blood test results. So then, these people seem to be telling us that getting people to where they no longer need- or need far less- diabetes meds, and improving the vast majority of other blood tests, and lowering their gut size and BP, leads to significantly higher death rates? I know I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so maybe that is why I am struggling with such results from academia? Oh, and, are these RCTs? No? Hmmm.
In the meantime, as studies go back and forth and we never know what bias might be behind the study of whatever, we have our own personal studies. We have our anecdotes based on the experience of ourselves and some of our friends and family. And their are several of us right here at HWPC that know dang well we can- in a couple of months at the most- cut our triglycerides in half by cutting way back on the carb. We can dramatically raise our HDL by eating high fat/low carb. We can dramatically lower our BP and waist/hip ratio. So, as long as my anecdotes result in such observations as that, then when it comes to studies like this(and their will be more of them), frankly my dear, I don't give a dang.
I have been my own study on this, but here is one of several(but not the one I'm thinking of that I have quoted previously, not randomized, just the 1st one I found):
assets.virtahealth.com/docs/Virta_Clinic_10-week_outcomes.pdfKeep in mind these were type 2 diabetics(T2D) already receiving the best medical practice has to offer. Metformin and more than metformin.
262 type 2 diabetics enrolled in a carbohydrate reduction group, individualized but commonly to < 30 gm/day. Protein at 1.5 gm per KG/day. I don't see fat amount.
1:Baseline A1cs were 7.6(mean) with only 19.8% having A1C <6.5. In 10 weeks, the mean was 6.5 and the % with <6.5 increased to 56%.
2:Fasting glucose mean dropped from 163 to 131!
3:Blood pressure was lowered 7 points!
4:Weight was lowered by over 19.8 lbs(7.6%).
5: Triglycerides were reduced from 185 to 145
6: The majority(234 or 90%) were taking one or more diabetes meds. In 10 weeks, of the 262 subjects, 112 (42.7%) had their meds reduced, and an additional 21(8%) had their meds ELIMINATED. (so 133 of 234(57%) had meds reduced or eliminated) 88(33%) had no change, and 28(10.7%) had an increase.
That is pretty dang good considering they were all presumably getting the best medical science had to offer. But what they needed even more than that was an adjustment to their diet, away from the one their docs had probably been recommending. But according to this OP study, and another one a couple of weeks ago, we should figure these guys who were now off of, or taking less, diabetic meds and with lower sugars and TGLs and BPs and gut size are going to die sooner than when they were eating more carbs? Hmmmm.