TIMES ONLINE: Margaret Thatcher, who famously railed against Britain being fed a European “diet of Brussels”, made her ascent to power sustained by eggs — more than two dozen of them a week — and not much else.
Documents released fom the former Prime Minister’s archive today include an Economist diary for 1979, into which is tucked a single typewritten sheet reading: “Mayo Clinic Diet.” This told her to eat eggs for breakfast every day, for lunch Monday to Friday, and often for dinner too.
“Weight loss should be around 20lb in two weeks (!),” it added, warning her in capital letters not to stay on this regimen for any longer. She was, however, allowed to drink whisky “on days when no meat is eaten”. Other forms of alcohol are not mentioned, suggesting that this programme was customised for Mrs Thatcher, who had long since indulged in whisky mixed with water.
In places there are annotations in her own hand, showing how she varied a monotonous diet — which also included no fewer than ten grapefruit a week — with beef, salad or cucumber soup.Modern-day nutritionists have reacted in horror to a regimen that they warned could cause “gastrointestinal side-effects”, namely wind, bad breath and constipation.
The Mayo Clinic, a renowned health group based in the US, swiftly condemned the diet as one of a number of quack cures that have circulated in recent years fraudulently using its name.
Dr Donald Hensrud, the clinic’s chief nutritionist, told The Times: “I would have told her to get off this diet immediately. It is a low-carb diet but very restrictive, no wholegrains, hardly any dairy. The more restrictive a diet, the more health problems there are. This is a potentially dangerous fad diet.” Thatcher went to work on an egg — and little else, archive reveals >>> Tom Baldwin | Saturday, January 30, 2010
