William Banting (1797–1878) | Banting guidelines
By the time William Banting retired from the family undertakers business in 1862, he weighed fourteen and a half stone (92kg) and at just 5ft 5in (163cm) was seriously overweight. Due to his size he was unable to bend over to tie his own shoes, had to walk down stairs backwards to relieve the pressure on his knee joints and wore a bulky truss to support an umbilical rupture. Banting's attempts to lose weight by rowing on the Thames and horseback riding proved unsuccessful.Diabetes diet
After suffering hearing loss, Banting consulted well-known ear surgeon, William Harvey. Harvey concluded that Banting's deafness was being caused by fat deposits in his throat pressing on his eustachian tubes. Harvey prescribed a weight-loss diet which cut out bread, butter, milk, sugar, beer and potatoes. This was based on the work of Dr Claude Bernard in Paris on diabetes. Traditionally it was thought that body fat was formed directly from dietary fat alone, but Bernard discovered that the liver itself makes glucose and stores it as glycogen. Bernard's new diabetes diet excluded glucose-producing foods – starches and sugars – as well as fats.
Harvey believed that Bernard's principles could be used to reduce corpulence as well as to treat diabetes. The diet worked, and in under a year Banting lost 46lb, he could walk down the stairs normally, no longer needed his truss and his sight and hearing improved.
A letter on corpulence
With evangelical zeal Banting set out to share the secret of his success by publishing the short pamphlet, 'A Letter On Corpulence'. In it, Banting presented obesity as a great social ill: "Of all the parasites that affect humanity…I do not know of, nor can I imagine, any more distressing than that of obesity." He described how since childhood he had feared becoming fat and the sneers and taunts that obese people suffer in public spaces. Banting's diet was as much an attempt to escape this social stigma and conform to Victorian expectations of what a normal body should be, than to improve health.
The pamphlet sold over 63,00 copies worldwide and gave rise to the term Bantingism as well as the phrase 'Do you Bant?' So embarrassed was Banting at having made money out of the misery of others, he donated all his proceeds to charities for the poor.
Read a facsimile copy of Banting's pamphlet online.