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Low Carbohydrate Diets May Increase Heart Disease Risk

Whole grains are an important source of carbohydrates, but some fad diets discourage this essential food group. To study how this may affect heart disease risk, researchers analyzed the diets and medical records of over 40,000 Swedish women for 15 years. They found that women eating a low carbohydrate diet were at a higher risk of heart disease, and that every 20g decrease in carbohydrates per day and 5g increase in protein per day corresponds to a 5% higher risk of heart disease. This suggests that grain-based diets rich in carbohydrates, the centuries-old traditional food pattern of our ancestors, are associated with a lower risk of heart disease than low carbohydrate diets.
British Medical Journal. 2012 Jun 26;344:e4026. (Lagiou P et al.)