On July 13, 2010, New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner died following a massive heart attack.

“Yankees owner George Steinbrenner dies at 80… He had just celebrated his 80^th birthday July 4. Steinbrenner had a heart attack… and died at about 6:30 on July 13, 2010… Steinbrenner was in fragile health for years… Steinbrenner had fainted at a memorial service for NFL star Otto Graham in 2003, appeared weak in 2006… Still, the former Big Ten football coach took umbrage when others questioned his fitness. ‘No I did not have a stroke, I am not ill. I work out daily’ Steinbrenner said in 2006. ‘I’d like to see people who are saying that to come down here and do the workout that I do.”

George Steinbrenner was not the first, nor will he be the last American to die as a result of a heart attack or stroke. In fact, nearly 50% of all deaths in America today are due to a heart attack or a stroke.

In America, every 30 seconds someone has a heart attack. This results in approximately 1.5 million Americans suffering a heart attack or myocardial infarction (MI) each year, while nearly 500,000 of them die as a result. And these heart attacks and strokes are occurring at earlier and earlier ages.

Last week in Health Tip #664 I shared a letter from Evelyn, who wrote, “Rev. Malkmus, last night a relative passed away from a massive heart attack. He was only 39 years old.” My own dad suffered his first heart attack at age 42, and after suffering several additional mild heart attacks and strokes, died of a massive heart attack at age 65. Recently, I learned of a pastor who died of a massive heart attack at the age of 45.

Dr. Joel Fuhrman, a medical doctor, in his book Eat To Live, had the following to say regarding heart attacks.

“Every one of those heart attacks is a terrible tragedy, as it could have been avoided. So many people die needlessly because of wrong, weak, and practically worthless information from the government, physicians, dietitians, and even health authorities like the American Heart Association. Conventional guidelines are simply insufficient to offer real protection for those wanting to protect themselves from heart disease.”

“If you are an American over the age of forty, your chance of having atherosclerosis (hardening) of your blood vessels is over 95 percent. You may think, ‘Heart disease won’t happen to me!’ But I have news for you: It has already happened, and your chance of dying from a heart attack because of your atherosclerosis is about 50 percent. Your exercise program and your Americanized low-fat diet won’t help you much, either.”

“A Vegetarian Diet Can Prevent 97% Of Our Coronary Occlusions”

Can you guess where this quote was found? This is a quote from The Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 176, No. 9, dated June 3, 1961, page 806. Almost 50 years ago, the American Medical Association knew that a well planned vegetarian diet could prevent most heart attacks. Why hasn’t the public been made aware of this information?

Next, let me quote from John Robbins book Diet For A New America.

“We know today how to prevent heart attacks and strokes. We know how to prevent the killers that account for half of the deaths in the United States every year. But most of us, thanks to the dedicated endeavors of the meat, dairy and egg industries, have not gotten the good news.

“We still think we must eat animal products in order to be healthy. We still think heart attacks and strokes are a regrettable but more or less inevitable byproduct that comes with living well and growing old. The heart attack has become so much a part of American life as to virtually be an institution. We take heart attacks for granted. Few of us know that our passive attitude is perpetuated by the deliberate efforts of those who profit from our STAYING HOOKED ON THE FOODS THAT CAUSE HEART DISEASE.

“As long as we remain passive we cannot make the real choices that empower us. Although there are people who do not want us to make such choices and are willing to do almost anything to confuse us, we now have for the first time in history, sufficient knowledge to take control over our bodies and our lives. Now we can make food choices which we know will dramatically improve the health of our cardiovascular system and prevent heart disease and strokes.”

AVERAGE FOUR YEAR OLD ALREADY HAS PLAQUE BUILDUP IN ARTERIES

Today, the average four-year-old already has plaque buildup in their arteries, while 75% of children between the ages of four and eleven already have signs of heart disease. During the Vietnam War, autopsies on soldiers who died on the battlefield revealed many had a 50% blockage while one out of twenty men had so much plaque buildup that 90% of an artery was blocked.

Arterial Plaque buildup can be defined thusly: “an abnormal hardened deposit on the inner wall of an artery.” Arteries are the part of the human circulatory system that carries blood to and from the heart and into capillaries. Exchange of oxygen, nutrients, and waste material takes place across capillary walls.

The interior of arteries should be smooth and unobstructed, but as one ages, if they consume a diet high in animal fat, a sticky substance commonly called plaque can develop and build up on the interior arterial walls. This plaque is comprised of fatty acids, calcium, and fibrous connective tissue. Veins do not develop atherosclerosis, unless surgically moved to function as an artery, as in bypass surgery.

This plaque and fat buildup in the arteries is the cause of high blood pressure. It is the reason doctors tell patient they have to take high blood pressure medication to lower their blood pressure. This plaque and fat buildup is also the reason doctors tell patients they have need for emergency surgery in order to install stents and perform bi-passes. This plaque and fat buildup is also the cause of nearly half of all deaths in America.

WHERE DOES ALL OF THIS FAT AND PLAQUE COME FROM?

Friend, that buildup of fat and plaque in the arteries didn’t come from nowhere! Rather it was placed into the body by the person experiencing the buildup.  This buildup comes from what a person eats and drinks! That’s right! All of the ingredients of that buildup in the arteries came from something the person put into their own body. They are simply reaping what they have sown.

And let me emphasize that this buildup has nothing whatsoever to do with genes. It has everything to do with what a person eats and drinks. We live in a day when those who haven’t a clue as to why a person develops a particular physical problem, in their ignorance, places blame on genes. But the culprit is not genes. It is diet.

The Bible implies in Proverbs 26:2 that this build up in the arteries did not just happen, but actually had a cause. Here is how the Bible explains it. “The curse causeless shall not come.”

In other words, the curse of the narrowing of those arteries by that fat and plaque buildup had a cause. Sadly, in today’s society, we do not seek out the cause of high blood pressure or that fat and plaque buildup, but rather deal exclusively with the symptom.

So the next time the doctor says, “I’m sorry friend, I have to give you a drug to lower or control your high blood pressure”, or the next time you have a pain in your chest and the doctor wants to rush you into by-pass surgery to give you new tubing to bypass the clogged artery, or stents to force open the artery blocked by fat, to allow more blood to flow in order to keep you alive, remember who created the condition.

But here is the good news! In most instances, you can eliminate the need for high blood pressure medicine, or even stent, or by-pass, by simply taking personal control and changing what you eat and drink. This puts you in control of the problem and not the doctor. Stop putting the animal fat into your body and the body will immediately set about removing that fat and plaque buildup on its own without doctor’s help.

The Bible explains how you got into this situation and how you can get out in Galatians 6:7: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” In other words, the law of sowing and reaping can be a curse or a blessing. This gives you the ability to choose the end result.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU CHOOSE A CHEESEBURGER, FRY & SHAKE?

About an hour after you go to a fast-food restaurant and consume a cheeseburger, fry, and milk shake, if you were to have your blood drawn and placed in a glass test tube, and allowed to settle, it wouldn’t be long before you would see in the bottom of the test tube red blood and floating on the top of the blood you would see an inch or so of yellow and white fat.

Where did all that fat come from? Friend, it didn’t come from nowhere! Rather it came from the fat in the hamburger and the fat in the cheese, the fat in the milk shake, and the fat in the fries. Remember, we just learned that “the curse causeless shall not come.” Sadly, we have now introduced the curse into our body.

If you were to tilt the glass test tube, you would see the fat floating on the blood actually clings to the wall of the test tube. Most do not realize that every bit of fat they consume passes into the blood, but it doesn’t all pass out of the blood. Some of that left behind fat starts to slough off and build up on the arterial wall, thus restricting blood flow.

This causes the heart to have to pump harder in order to push the blood through that buildup of fat coating the arterial wall. This fat buildup is the cause the high blood pressure, for which the doctor prescribes a drug. Does the drug correct the cause of the high blood pressure or does the drug prevent the continued build up of fat on the arterial wall? No way!

Nor do by-pass surgery or stents correct the problem more than temporarily. For those who have these types of surgeries, if they continue to consume animal products containing animal fat, they will usually have additional need for stents or by-passes as the buildup continues and ultimately leads to a fatal heart attack or stroke.

Over time, this fat is joined with calcium and other minerals from the high mineral content of the ground water most people drink and the inorganic calcium found in many calcium supplements, and starts to mix with the fat and starts to harden the fat already lining the arterial walls. This mineral laden fat becomes plaque.

HOW TO REDUCE YOUR POTENTIAL FOR A HEART ATTACK BY 97%

Dr. T. Colin Campbell, PhD, Cornell University, author of The China Study had the following to say on pages 130-132 of his book.

“The future is filled with hope. We now know enough to nearly eliminate heart disease. We know not only how to prevent the disease, but how to successfully treat it. We do not need to crack open our breast plates to reroute our arteries, and we do not need a lifetime of powerful drugs in our blood. By eating the right food, we can keep our hearts healthy…

“Whether scientists, doctors and policy makers think the public will change or not, the layperson must be aware that a whole foods, plant-based diet is far and away the healthiest diet. In the seminal paper regarding the landmark Lifestyle Heart Trial, the authors, Dr. Ornish and his scientific colleagues, write: ‘The point of our study was to determine what is true, not what is practicable.’

“We now know what is true: a whole food, plant-based diet can prevent and treat heart disease, saving hundreds of thousands of Americans every year. . . . Now is the time of great hope and challenge, a time when people can control their health. . . .”

Dr. Joel Fuhrman, author of Eat To Live, concludes:

“The ideal diet for heart disease reversal is free of saturated fat, Tran’s fat, and cholesterol; and rich in nutrients and fiber; and low in calories. . . . Chicken is almost as dangerous for the heart as red meat; switching from red meat to white meat does not lower cholesterol sufficiently and does not contain adequate heart-protective factors. . . . Numerous studies have documented that heart disease is reversible for the majority of patients following a vegetarian diet.”

HALLELUJAH ACRES DIET AND LIFESTYLE TO THE RESCUE

For nearly 20 years, Hallelujah Acres has been sharing with everyone who would listen, a diet that would prevent 97% of all heart attacks and strokes. How could a diet do this? By eliminating the “curse”, the consumption of animal flesh and dairy, which is the cause!

The Hallelujah Acres Diet contains zero animal fat. In place of the meat and dairy, which contains that animal fat that cause the heart attacks and strokes, is a 100% plant based diet. This is the very diet Dr. Campbell promotes when he says “a whole food, plant-based diet can prevent and treat heart disease, saving hundreds of thousands of Americans every year.”

As I conclude this article, let me share where the diet we proclaim here at Hallelujah Acres came from.

It came from God! This diet is found in the Bible in Genesis 1:29. This was the diet God gave that very first human, Adam, immediately after God had created him. It was comprised of 100% plant foods and contained zero animal fat. The Hallelujah Acres diet which we have been proclaiming for the past 20 years and the diet promoted by Dr. Campbell, Dr. Fuhrman, and John Robbins is very similar to the Genesis 1:29 diet.

Might it be that God was and is far wiser than we humans? I personally listened to God and adopted the same diet God gave Adam almost 35 years ago and have already outlived my dad by over 10 years. Dad died of a massive heart attack at age 65. I will be 77 on my next birthday. If the cause of a heart attack is in the genes, I should have been dead years ago. Instead, today, I have a lean, muscular, physical body capable of doing anything physically I could do at the age of 20.