Editor:

Unhealthy foods cause obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and other deadly problems. We need a national discussion on nutrition, so I appreciate Judy Hodgson's recent column ("Obesity, How'd THAT Happen?," Jan. 22). Judy bases much of her article on the work of Robert Lustig, MD. His recommendations are significantly better than the "standard American diet," but they don't go nearly far enough. Sugar is not the only villain.

Has Dr. Lustig demonstrated reversal of heart disease with his diet? This has definitely been done with a whole food, plant-based diet, by Dean Ornish, MD, and by Caldwell Esselstyn, Jr., MD. Has Dr. Lustig demonstrated reversal of type-2 diabetes, high blood pressure, or high cholesterol, enabling people to reduce or get off of medications for these conditions? This is routinely done with a whole food, plant-based diet, as described in the books of Joel Fuhrman, John McDougall, Neal Barnard (all MDs), and others.

My wife and I have dramatically improved our health eating lots of vegetables, fruits, beans, intact whole grains, and nuts and seeds. With a period of transition, our tastes have been reprogrammed and we now enjoy food more than ever before! Kaiser Permanente has examined the research and now has a 20-page pamphlet called The Plant-Based Diet: A Healthier Way to Eat, which can be instantly found with a web search. Interested persons might check out the movie Forks Over Knives, and the book The China Study by T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D. Entertaining short videos by Michael Greger, MD, at www.nutritionfacts.org summarize and link to lots of research on nutrition. Also, a recent documentary called Cowspiracy focuses on the ecological disaster of animal agriculture.

A healthy, plant-based diet removes factory-farm cruelty from our plates and helps the planet at the same time! It's a win, win, win.

Brian Julian, Blue Lake