J. Morris Hicks, engineer. writer. big picture guy.

First Book Review…from a PhD in Dallas

Posted on 09/16/2011 by J. Morris Hicks

A great week; books arrived Tuesday — First “review” arrived yesterday

My living room has some new furniture -- 16 cartons of books. The mail packages on the floor went out on Tuesday and among them was one to Dr. Bob Wyatt in Dallas.

My week really kicked into gear on Tuesday when 545 copies of our book were delivered to my doorstep by FedEx. Having already prepared thirty Priority Mail packages to all those who had helped with the book, I immediately sent out books to those who provided inspiration & encouragement and to endorsers, my editor, my agent, family and very close friends. Dr. Bob Wyatt in Dallas was on that first distribution list and, to my knowledge, is the first person to read the printed book.

Yesterday I began my bookstore tour of New England to meet the shop owners, introduce our book and invite them to our book launch party on September 29. By this time next week, I expect to have visited a dozen college bookstores on campuses such as Harvard, M.I.T., Wellesley, Holy Cross, Trinity, Smith, Williams, NYU, Princeton and Columbia. One of the beauties of this area is that you can reach all of those great institutions within a two hour drive of my home here in coastal CT. Next week is going to be fun! Why the emphasis on colleges? See this post: To the collegiate army that will change the world — this is for you.

Robert S. Wyatt, PhD

The first book review. The highlight of the day for me was a message from perhaps the first person that has read our book in printed form — from cover to cover in one sitting. My friend and colleague, Robert S. Wyatt, PhD, wrote last night:

Jim, I decided that my top priority this afternoon was reading your book which I did. It took only a few hours, not because I am a particularly fast reader but for two other reasons. First, I am familiar with its contents. More importantly however, it is a “great read.” You raise all the right issues but do so in a way that is readily approachable, and non-threatening, specifically to members of the medical community.

I cannot stress enough how well written the book is. Although the topic is deadly serious, the clever wording and phrases make reading it a pleasure. I placed an order for a case yesterday with the intention of giving them out as Christmas gifts to clients, associates and family. It will not surprise me if I need to order a second case. Great job! Bob

John Paine, editor

After reading this message last night, I picked up the phone and called my good friend, “Dr. Bob,” and he shared more of his thoughts. As he talked about different aspects of the book, I immediately thought of my editor, John Paine, over in Montclair, NJ. Although John and I have never met face-to-face, this time last year we were joined at the hip as we were in the midst of the final 60 days of putting our book together.

A highly experienced editor who helped Dr. Oz with one of his first books, I must thank my agent, Marilyn, for introducing me to John. Laid up with a ruptured Achilles tendon, I leaned heavily on him as the deadline approached. All of the above is exactly why I immediately thought of John Paine as I read the words from Dr. Bob last night. Because of John, this is a much better book and I am now a better writer. Thank you John. Let’s get together for lunch next week when I will be in your neighborhood as I make my way to Princeton.

The massive Yale BookStore in New Haven, CT

Yale BookStore. After delivering a book to a newspaper writer in New Haven yesterday, I decided to visit the Yale bookstore and I’m glad that I did. What a delightful morning, a warm late-summer day, a gorgeous campus and interesting people everywhere. One of the most interesting was Harry, the trade book buyer at one of the biggest college bookstores I have ever seen. I gave him a copy of our book and invited him to our party on the 29th. He asked if I would be willing to do events at his store and told me that he just might show up at our party.

Countdown to book launch party. Just 13 from days from now, on September 29 at the Saltwater Farm Vineyard in Stonington, CT. Party begins at 5:30 — Let me know if you need an invitation.

If you like what you see here, you may wish to join our periodic mailing list. Also, for help in your own quest to take charge of your health, you might find some useful information at our 4-Leaf page. From the seaside village of Stonington, Connecticut – Be well and have a great day.

If you’d like to order our book on Amazon, visit our BookStore now.

—J. Morris Hicks…blogging daily at HealthyEatingHealthyWorld.com

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From “Disease-Care” to Health-Care — An inevitable transition

Posted on 09/15/2011 by J. Morris Hicks

Who is going to lead it and what happens to our “system” in the process?

We all know that our “system” of health-care is primarily “managing” a host of diseases that need never occur in the first place. Diseases like obesity, diabetes, coronary artery disease, osteoporosis, and yes — even cancer and Alzheimer’s. We’re spending some $2 trillion out of our total health care bill of $2.7 trillion unnecessarily. How so?

Medical doctors will always be needed for acute care but not so much for chronic diseases -- once we all learn how to eat the right food.

We now know from a combination of numerous scientific and clinical studies that a simple diet of whole, plant-based foods can make us “heart-attack proof” and can quickly reverse many diseases that we already have. Yet our “system” of medicine, big pharma, the USDA, the FDA, academia and food industry just keeps plodding along telling us the same harmful information and making the same products that cause most of our problems in the first place. So, how is it going to change itself from disease-care to health-care? A note from a reader in Texas (Robert B.) prompted me to address that question:

I have always been a big fan of Dr. T. Colin Campbell, and now there is someone who is promoting his principles of sound whole plant nutrition and prosperous living. We need to get the word out to all of the healthcare professionals who will listen and apply this data into their practice and in the lives of their patients. This will be true healthcare reform. Robert in San Antonio

Dear Robert, I appreciate your comment about Dr. Campbell and the era of “true health-care reform.” Like you say, wouldn’t it be great if today’s disease care professionals started “applying this new data” in their practices. But the sad part of it is that they wouldn’t be able to earn a living if they did. If 80 percent of our cost of health care were to gradually disappear, so would millions of today’s jobs.

An honorable profession, how many nurses do you need to take care of healthy people?

That’s because they’re really in the disease care business and therefore, only make money if we’re sick. They’ve all been trained to manage disease; how can we now expect them to suddenly start promoting health with dietary advice, in which they have had zero training. All of the medical doctors in our book learned about promoting health on their own — the same way you and I are doing.

And once the health-promoting diet becomes a part of our culture, we won’t need very many people telling us what we should be eating — or fixing the problems that are driven by eating the wrong food. In my opinion, true health-care reform will be driven by individual citizens like us — deciding to take charge of their own health. As that process gathers momentum, the “system” will gradually change. And that’s what we want; overnight change would be an economic disaster.

Savage Hall, home of the Department of Nutritional Science at Cornell University where Dr. Campbell earned his PhD. and taught for many years

But, with gradual change, the schools of medicine and schools of nutrition will re-vamp their teachings, current doctors and nurses will re-invent themselves as wellness coaches, and the food companies will simply deliver what the market wants — more and more delicious and nutritious, health-promoting, whole, plant-based foods.

What about the millions of people in the big pharmaceutical companies who are making drugs for the diseases that will soon be going away? They might want to think about a career change into a growing industry — something like “green energy.”

Drug companies; spending billions "searching for the cure" when it's been right under our noses all along -- it's what we put in our mouths. May I suggest a future career in "green energy?"

The exciting thing about what history will record as “the great food revolution of the twenty-first century” is that we are leading it. With the help of great scientific and clinical information from the likes of Esselstyn, Campbell and Ornish — along with the incredible power of the internet to circulate information, our grassroots revolution will gradually drive the inevitable change that will lead to true health-care reform.

Want to do your part? Please use the SHARE button below to spread the good news to those who are ready to hear the message — to those who are ready to take charge of their own health, thereby joining the grassroots revolution to change the world.

Thanks again for your comment, Robert. If you like what you see here, you may wish to join our periodic mailing list. Also, for help in your own quest to take charge of your health, you might find some useful information at our 4-Leaf page. From the seaside village of Stonington, Connecticut – Be well and have a great day.

If you’d like to order our book on Amazon, visit our BookStore now.

—J. Morris Hicks…blogging daily at HealthyEatingHealthyWorld.com

Posted in Activism & Leadership, Food Policy, Grassroots Revolution | Tagged disease care, health care reform, reversing heart disease | 3 Comments

OBESITY. Where’s the “urgent fight” to end it? — NY Times

Posted on 09/14/2011 by J. Morris Hicks

Jane Brody reports the staggering statistics — but mentions no solution

Veteran NY Times health writer, Jane Brody

In a recent Times article (9-12-11, see link below) entitled “The Numbers Behind an Urgent Fight,” Ms. Brody chronicles the latest numbers when it comes to the costs of treating obesity and the obesity-related increase in the number of cases of diabetes, heart disease and cancer. She predicts that if the current trend continues, “about three of every four Americans will be overweight or obese by 2020.” She continues…

By 2030 there could be 65 million more obese adults in the United States than in 2010, according to the epidemiologist Dr. Y. Claire Wang and her colleagues at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. The health consequences of such a rise in obesity are staggering. It would mean 8 million more cases of diabetes, 6.8 million more cases of atherosclerotic heart disease and stroke and more than 500,000 more cases of cancer.

Certainly the above numbers would warrant an “urgent fight” as the title reads. But, my question is “Where is the fight?” Who’s fighting? Over 90% of Americans are still chowing down on meat, dairy and highly processed foods three times a day. And yes, that means over 90% of the doctors, the dietitians, nutrition professors, the pharmaceutical execs, school teachers, etc. — almost everyone is still eating some version of our toxic, disease-promtoing Western diet.

This could be your grandchildren in 20 years. Want to join the FIGHT?

Where’s the fight? Oh, some would say that Michelle Obama is fighting. She planted a vegetable garden at the White House, she’s pitching for healthier school lunches and she’s partnered with Wal-Mart to promote healthier food choices. But, at the same time, she’s serving a big spread of brats, cheeses and other obesity-driving Western diet foods at her own Super Bowl party.

Where’s the fight? How about a serious effort to educate the American public about the plethora of negative consequences of the way most of us are eating? How about Jane Brody sitting down with Michelle Obama, Sanjay Gupta, and Bill Clinton and mapping out an educational strategy that would include a piece about “preventing and reversing obesity” in both the New York Times and on CNN every single day — forever — or until obesity is eliminated, whichever comes first.

The closest thing that I saw in Ms. Brody’s article to addressing the cause of obesity was this statement about the projected 500,000 additional cases of cancer, “The cancer statistics alone should be enough to keep one’s mouth from closing on a double cheeseburger and fries.”

I believe there are some knowledgeable people of integrity in the media who might be ready to join the FIGHT on a full-time basis. How about it, Sanjay?

If I can write a blog every single day, why can’t the premier media organizations of the world each write an educational piece every day about what is quite possibly our nation’s single biggest problem — our cost of health care? Why is the media not reminding us every chance they get about the blinding flash of the obvious solution to the mess we’re in?

We all know the answer to that question. MONEY. There is simply no money to be made by everyone getting healthy. If we all got healthy, we’d shave $2 trillion off the cost of health care — and those $2 trillion are currently going into someone’s pocket. That said, no politician could ever get elected if he/she even hinted (in New Jersey for example), that we may be able to completely eliminate the need for prescription medicine by 2030. We all know that our “system” won’t permit our elected officials to lead the FIGHT. That leaves US.

Where’s the fight? As for me, I joined the fight on February 9 of this year and this is my 219th consecutive daily blog since. You want to join the fight? How about sending my daily blog every day to someone you care about? There’s a SHARE button at the bottom of every post — making it real easy for you to email, tweet, or post on Facebook and a few other social media sites. You might want to start by sharing a few of these earlier posts dealing with obesity:

Obesity, diet and the CEO of the American Heart Association

Obesity, diabetes — still getting worse, with no end in sight…

Michelle, it’s time to tell the world about “meat & dairy.”

Michelle Obama…coming up short on healthy eating

Eskimos, obesity, diabetes and unsustainability — NPR

NYT…”Obesity Epidemic Points to Workplace” — I say Baloney!

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