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Food and movement

Does intermittent fasting actually work?

It works about as well as any other method that reduces total intake, and no better. The evidence does not support a unique metabolic advantage. What it does offer some people is simplicity — fewer decisions, fewer eating windows. If it suits your routine it is reasonable; if it makes you ravenous at dinner it is not.

Trials comparing intermittent fasting with continuous calorie restriction generally find similar results when total intake is matched. That is a useful thing to know before reorganising your life around it.

Who it tends to suit

  • People who prefer rules to arithmetic and find one decision easier than twenty
  • People who genuinely are not hungry in the morning, rather than people trying not to be
  • People whose work pattern already produces a natural eating window

Who should not attempt it without advice

Anyone on medication for diabetes, particularly insulin or sulfonylureas, where skipping meals carries a real hypoglycaemia risk. Anyone pregnant or breastfeeding. Anyone with a history of disordered eating, for whom rigid rules around food are a known hazard.

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