Zev Yaroslavsky Gets Converted to the Religion of Good Nutrition

It was exactly a year ago that L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky began seeing a blur out of his right eye. His optometrist told him his vision had diminished 22% since the previous exam, and suggested he get checked out for diabetes.

Diabetes?

Yaroslavsky shrugged it off, even though his mother, who died of cancer when Zev was 10, had diabetes. He had been feeling fatigued and frequently thirsty, but his nonstop schedule was explanation enough.

Besides, he ran three or four miles a day and watched what he ate, except for one incurable weakness. Many nights, on his way home to Hancock Park, he stopped at Baskin-Robbins for a pint of chocolate chip ice cream.

A month after his eye exam, Yaroslavsky had a respiratory problem and went to see his regular doctor for a chest X-ray. While he was there, he had some blood work done. Then came the good news-bad news call from his doctor.

The chest X-ray was clean, but Yaroslavsky had Type 2 diabetes, the type that does not require insulin injections.

“What’s it mean?” asked Yaroslavsky, 53.

The doctor told him it meant he could change his diet and lifestyle, take medication to control his cholesterol, and probably manage the disease. Or he could stick with the chocolate chip ice cream and risk amputation, blindness, heart disease and stroke.

“I went cold turkey,” Yaroslavsky says. “I went home and there was still some chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer, and I told my wife to leave it there as a test of my own willpower.”

Potatoes, rice, and macaroni were out. At banquets, he’d ask for just a salad or a piece of fish with vegetables or fruit.

“My wife is a terrific cook, and she makes me an egg white omelet every morning with phony sausage and phony cheese made from soy. I can’t even tell the difference.”

He still picks up a pint of something frozen at night, but now it’s fat-free and sugar-free strawberry-banana yogurt.

Yaroslavsky’s weight has fallen from 201 pounds to 175, his vision has been restored because of the adjustment in blood-sugar levels, his cholesterol has plunged from the high 200s to the mid 100s, and he legs out a 12- to 15-mile beach run on weekends at a faster clip than he’s known in years.

Zev Yaroslavsky got religion, and now, more than ever, he is plugged in to public health issues. Early this month, he went nuts over the story that said nearly 80% of California’s schoolchildren are out of shape.

Given the link between obesity and diabetes, why have schools de-emphasized physical education over the years? he wonders.

What’s the long-term cost of the junk food culture?

If there’s a genetic predisposition to diabetes among Latinos and African Americans, and the disease is showing up in younger age groups all the time, what kind of public health disaster is coming our way in Los Angeles?

“One out of two students in L.A. Unified doesn’t have health insurance, and this is a nail in our budget coffin down the line when someone gets diabetes,” Yaroslavsky says.

But nothing agitates him like the fact that school districts, including L.A. Unified, sell fast food chains and soft drink companies the right to hawk their products on campus.

“It’s criminal,” he rants. “The number of overweight and obese students is amazing, and it’s just plain ridiculous that we’re continuing to hand out chocolate chip cookies and drinks loaded with sugar.

“We’ve got to lay the foundation in our schools, but it’s hard to teach nutrition if the student walks out of class and there’s a Coke machine in the hall.”

Or if junior goes home after school and Mom or Dad is halfway through a bag of cheese puffs and a Super Big Gulp.

I told Yaroslavsky I’d just visited a Boyle Heights elementary school that serves chorizo and egg tacos for breakfast. A school where two of the students, many of their parents and several members of the cafeteria manager’s family have diabetes.

“The worst thing is that the child doesn’t know what’s happening,” Yaroslavsky said. “You’ve got a kid who’s 40 pounds overweight by ninth grade, he might have diabetes and not even know it, his blood-sugar is sky high, he can barely see the blackboard, he’s dozing off in afternoon math class, and the teacher treats it as a discipline problem.

“I don’t know if anyone even knows how to work the equation: If we invest in a physical education and nutrition campaign now, how much will it save us down the road? It’s not something anyone is talking about,” Yaroslavsky says.

He decided to tell his personal story--yes, there is life after ice cream--as a way to begin the discussion.

Come the first of the year, Yaroslavsky plans to roust school bosses and legislators from their slumber on this subject. He doesn’t know exactly how to attack the problem, but he knows that now is the hour.

“We need leadership at every level,” he says. “This is a time bomb about to go off.”

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Steve Lopez writes Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He can be reached at steve.lopez@latimes.com.