There are more untruths, misconceptions and myths about this subject than any other subject I have ever come across, for years I have been trying to get through to people that this is not a complicated area if you get rid of the promotional material, opinions and myths. HealthCastle has been doing the same, but rubbish seems to take on a life of it's own, it's immortal, you can't seem to kill it off.
Scientists have been working hard to formulate new policies to advise people about how much food they need as well as the type of food.
Weight Loss Myths and Big Fat Lies
At least twelve times per week I am asked is some weight loss myth or lie true. Because of inaccuracies written up in the popular press people are confused. A survey of 173 doctors and general practice registrars in medical education and 129 truck drivers and trades people showed similar lack of knowledge for weight loss. Doctors, it appears, are just as influenced by the popular press’s wrong weight loss advice, as the public themselves.
Here are some corrections to myths – diet is better for weight loss than exercise, it is much easier not to eat 1000 kcals/day rather than walking the equivalent- about 15kilometres per day. Exercise is healthy and helps keep the weight off after you have lost it.
Swimming is not as good as walking for weight loss and neither is bike riding, fat floats and requires less effort, a Stanford University study in 2003 also showed raising the temperature reduces hunger, and swimming does not do that.
Fruit juice is just as fattening as beer; they contain roughly the same number of calories. Beer belly is a myth because the body cannot store alcohol it has to burn it up. Correct terminology would be an eating while drinking beer belly. Another myth is that fat people get hungry quicker than skinny people, or spices make you hungry. You do not need 8 glasses of water daily; it all depends on what you are doing and temperature.
Protein controls hunger so a reasonable amount of protein in the diet is better than a low protein diet for weight loss, what makes you fat is too much energy (calories) in the diet, and high glycaemic index foods will burn quicker than low. Push-ups do not reduce fat from the belly the fastest.
http://www.racgp.org.au/afp/200911/200911egger.pdf
Cheers
