Nutrition for Optimal Health Association, Inc.

Joseph D. Beasley, MD, MPH

The newly released Kellogg report, The Impact of Nutrition, Environment & Life-style on the Health of Americans, by Joseph D. Beasley, MD, and Jerry J. Swift, MA, gives us a comprehensive look at the state of our health in the United States, with the above warning and many recommendations. More than seven years in the making, this report was funded by grants from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Ford Foundation, though the authors state that the report reflects their own views and not those of the foundations. Given its length (735 pages), the report is amazingly readable and accessible. Its fundamental emphasis is on optimal nutrition, which its authors, however, consider unobtainable in any absolute sense, as every person’s needs change from day to day. Nevertheless, much can be learned from this book; a few highlights follow.

Throughout the book, Beasley and Swift emphasize biochemical individuality and the work of the late Roger J. Williams, PhD, whose 1971 book, Nutrition Against Disease, inspired the founding of NOHA, and who became an honorary member of NOHA. (This book, they say, is "probably the best single book on the relationship of poor diet to illness.")