Bill Clinton Diet: Has Junk Food Lover Really Gone Vegetarian?

(CBS) President Clinton - famous for his appetite for junk food - says he's made the switch to a healthy, plant-based diet.

He told Wolf Blitzer on CNN that although he eats a little fish, he stays away from other meat - dairy too. He's learned to like almond milk.

His reasoning? His surgically cleared coronary arteries began to re-clog, he said on the CNN program. It was then that  he learned that heart patients who adopt a plant-based diet usually start getting better on their own.

"Their bodies begin to heal themselves," he said. "Well, since I needed to lose a little weight for Chelsea's wedding, I thought I'd be a part of the experiment and see if I could be one of those."

He ended up shedding 24 pounds. No word on the condition of his coronary arteries, though science seems to back his new diet.

Says the American Dietetic Association: "Appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases."

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