Bill Clinton Goes Vegan

by NowPublic Staff | August 19, 2011 at 10:30 am

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Bill Clinton Goes from Omnivore to Vegan

In an interview with CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta, former US President Bill Clinton announced that he has gone vegan. Clinton's goal: to get back down to his junior high weight of 185 lbs. 185 seems heavy for a 13-year-old, but would be manageable for the 58-year-old Bill Clinton.

Clinton had battled his weight-- and heart problems-- for years, and underwent quadruple bypass surgery in 2004. While a vegan lifestyle is not necessarily for everyone, requiring operations on all four chambers of your heart at the same time is as clear a wake-up call as you could want that you need to make drastic changes.

Veganism entails giving up the consumption of any animal product: no milk or cheese or meat. And, yes, this includes giving up fish.

Strict veganism would also mean giving up wearing leather or using any product derived from animals to the extent possible.

American Vegan Society has more detail

Bill Clinton is partnering with the American Heart Association, and is working to get schools to promote exercise and provide better lunches. Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver also tried this, and met with tremendous amounts of resistance.

Last year, the former president went to Haiti to support the relief efforts but he felt weak. When he returned home, he learned he needed another heart procedure: two stents to open one of the veins from his bypass surgery, which had become, in Clinton's words, "pretty bent and ugly."