 Healthy plant-based diets have been associated with lower all-cause mortality, up to a 34% lower risk of death from any cause, over an average of an eight-year period, just being the top versus bottom quarter of healthy plant-based consumption. If sustained, that could translate into more than four extra years of life. A meta-analysis of a dozen studies, prospectively following more than a half million people for up to a 25-year simile, found significantly lower heart disease and overall death rates among those eating more plant-based. No surprise, a systematic review concluded, since plant-based diets may arrest or even reverse our number one killer, cardiovascular disease. Those eating holy plant-based tend to be significantly slimmer with lower LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, blood sugars, blood pressure, significantly less inflammation, and less crotted artery wall thickening, a sign of atherosclerosis measured via ultrasound in the neck. As good as what you see in endurance athletes who've run an average of 50,000 miles, which is like twice around the globe. And changes in risk factors can happen fast, as evidenced by results from 1, 2, 3-week ad libitum, eat all you want, plant-based kickstart programs. For example, the results from the first few hundred participants of the at-home 15-day jumpstart program created by the non-profit Rochester Lifestyle Medicine Institute were recently published. On a hopeful plant-based diet, obese patients lost an average of seven pounds without controlling portions or counting calories or carbs. Diabetics saw their fasting blood sugars drop 28 points. Those with LDL cholesterol over 100 experienced a 33-point drop, comparable to some statin drugs. And hypertensive individuals experienced a 17-point drop in systolic blood pressure, which is better than drugs, and all within just two weeks. Studies dating back nearly 40 years show those eating meat-free diets also have improved blood rheology, meaning fluidity or flowability, which may play a role in cardiovascular protection. Subsequent interventional studies putting the cross-sectional findings to the test show that switching people to a plant-based diet can improve rheology measurements within three to six weeks. But might the blood of vegetarians flow a bit too? Well, though, in 2019, a study of thousands of British vegetarians called Epic Oxford found that they were at a higher risk of hemorrhagic or bleeding stroke. They had such a lower risk of heart disease that they still had less cardiovascular disease overall, and half-dozen studies show no overall increased risk of stroke mortality. But why the greater stroke incidence? I suggest it might be vitamin B12 deficiency, which can lead to excessive levels of a stroke-associated metabolite called homocysteine, which is normally detoxified by B12. This is not to be the reason why vitamin B12 supplementation can improve artery function of vegetarians. Vitamin B12 supplements of fortified foods are critical for anyone eating plant-based, but my 12-part video series on vegetarians and stroke risk triggered by the 2019 publication was all in vain. It turns out vegetarians don't appear to have higher stroke risk, after all. In response to the Epic Oxford results, researchers around the world scrambled to see if the findings were merely a fluke. In 2020, UK Biobank, a massive study following more than 400,000 volunteers, confirmed that vegetarians had lower cardiovascular disease rates, and importantly, no increased incidence of stroke. In two studies from Taiwan, found vegetarians had significantly lower risk of stroke. Following tens of thousands of vegetarians for up to 10 years, they only had about half the stroke risk compared to non-vegetarians, including a 64% lower risk specifically of hemorrhagic stroke. By 2021, Harvard researchers had finished and published their analyses of the 200,000-plus participants of the Nurses Health Study, the Nurses Health Study II, and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. They, too, found no increased stroke risk for vegetarians, and indeed a decreased risk of stroke among those eating healthy plant-based diets. A meta-analysis putting all the studies together found that indeed, the Epic Oxford data appeared to be a fluke, after all, finding, if anything, a lower risk of stroke in a subgroup analysis. A 2022 systematic review concluded that vegetarian and low-animal product diets are associated with a significantly lower risk of bleeding strokes, a significant lower risk of clotting strokes, and a significant lower risk of total strokes across the board.