16:8 Fasting Diet Actually Works

A form of intermittent fasting known as the 16:8 diet helps obese individuals to lose weight and lower their blood pressure, according to a new study.

More and more people now turn to intermittent fasting as a fast and effective way to lose weight. There are different forms of this diet, depending on the time intervals of “fasting” and “feasting.” The so-called 5:2 diet, for instance, consists of eating normally for 5 days every week and fasting for 2 days. In the fasting days, the dieter restricts their calorie intake to 500 or 600 per day. In the daily fasting, or the 16:8 diet, people eat whatever they like for 8 hours and fast for the remaining 16.

A new study evaluates the benefits of this 16:8 pattern for obese individuals and finds that not only does the diet work, but also that it helps to lower blood pressure.

As many as 93.3 million adults have obesity in the United States, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That’s almost 40% of the country’s entire population.

This research was led by corresponding author Krista Varady, an associate professor of kinesiology and nutrition at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the findings were published in the journal Nutrition and Healthy Aging.

Varady and colleagues recruited 23 obese study participants who were aged 45 years, on average, with the average body mass index (BMI) of 35. Between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m., the participants could eat whatever and however much they liked, but they were only allowed to drink water and calorie-free drinks for the remaining 16 hours.