As everyone living on this planet has certainly noticed, the Atkins diet has been growing in popularity over the past few years. Many people have enjoyed remarkable success losing weight with the diet, although its critics are also growing in number. One of the biggest criticisms about the Atkins diet is that when the dieter reduces the amount of carbohydrate intake, the body undergoes a number of biological processes that are similar to those that occur during fasting or starvation.

One annoying but common side effect of the Atkins diet is bad breath. The Atkins diet brings about halitosis because of a process known as ketosis, which is actually the same process the body goes through during fasting or starvation. Atkins and other low carbohydrate diets cause the body to burn stored-up fat tissue. Without the easy sugar found in carbs, the body must burn its own fat in order to create glucose for energy. In the process it also creates chemicals called ketones as a secondary energy source.

Ketosis and ketones are said to be a mixed bag for the body. When the body burns ketones, it rapidly gets rid of unwanted toxins, which is one of the benefits of fasting. Proponents of the Atkins diet consider this as a good thing, because it shows that the diet is actually working.

Unfortunately though, ketones are released through the breath and urine, and because they contain so many toxins, they tend to have an unpleasant and unavoidable odor.

There’s no easy fix for this problem, since it’s the way the body burns fat, which is a desired outcome of the diet. One way to reduce the bad breath associated with the diet is to drink a great deal of water. This “waters down” the ketones, ridding the body of more of them through the urine instead of the breath. Drinking plenty of water literally washes away a number of particles that can contribute to the bad breath.

Commercially available breath products can help to mask the effects of the low carb diet on the breath as well, but they’re not a permanent solution.

If the bad breath associated with the Atkins diet proves to be too cumbersome, there are other similar diets, such as the South Beach diet, which allow a greater consumption of carbs. A few more carbs tends to lessen the bad breath byproduct that can be associated with a strict Atkins diet.