Then one day, he chanced upon a pro-vegan documentary on Netflix called ‘Game Changers’. And suddenly he had a purpose again. He decided to devote his life to living healthy instead of letting the pandemic get him down.

“I did more research and discovered that there were well-credentialed doctors who promoted a whole-food plant-based diet, which basically refers to a ‘healthy vegan’ diet, as opposed to a ‘junk food vegan’ diet,” said the American who has lived in Malaysia for 12 years.

Overnight, Polkowski switched from being a self-professed carnivore, to a healthy vegan diet advocate.

“I started cooking a lot, and after just two weeks, I started seeing the difference; I felt amazing!” he said, adding that he has since stopped having heartburn, headaches and joint pains.

“It made me wonder why I hadn’t discovered this before; why wasn’t there more information available.”

He started looking for doctors who were advocates of such a diet and found Dr Vythilingam Pillay, former president of the Malaysian Vegetarian Society. Together with celebrity vegan chef, Kalidevan Murugaya, fondly known as Chef Dave, they got a group of people to try out this new diet.

“The trial run went amazing – even the doctors were surprised by the improved markers in the participants’ blood test results,” Polkowski said.

Encouraged by this success, he co-founded PB Health in July 2020, a social enterprise that aims to improve one’s health via whole-food plant-based diets.

Those interested can try out PB Health’s challenge for either seven or 14 days. “We started out with the 14-day challenge, but some said that it was too long, so we introduced the week-long challenge.”

Having said that, he recommends the 14-day challenge as in the first week, some may experience discomfort from gas and bloating as the body adapts to the change in diet.

“But by the seventh or eighth day, all of that goes away, and the second week is much smoother,” he said.

The challenge package includes two wholesome meals per day, delivered to anywhere within the Klang Valley. All meals are low in salt and oil, and are free from preservatives, additives and refined products.

In addition to before-and-after blood tests and online doctor consultations, participants are also included in a WhatsApp group which includes PB Health’s doctors, chefs and nutritionists.

According to Polkowski, more than 400 people, from 18 to 75 years old, have joined the challenge so far and the results have been amazing. Most weren’t vegetarians or vegans but joined for health reasons, he said.

Polkowski recalls a participant who only found out she was diabetic upon taking her first blood test before the challenge.

“She was understandably distraught, but upon seeing improved health markers after the challenge, she continued taking the meals and after three months, all her numbers were within the normal range and she was no longer diabetic,” he said.

According to the Health Ministry’s 2019 National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS), more than half of the Malaysian adult population is overweight or obese, 20% are diabetic, 38.1% have high cholesterol, and about 30% have hypertension.

“These are all lifestyle diseases that can be treated with a good diet and exercise,” Polkowski said.

Despite this, he said many people ‘shut off’ immediately upon hearing the words ‘plant-based’ or ‘vegan’, so he and his team focus on the health benefits instead.

There are still, however, many misconceptions about vegan food. “People are worried about not getting enough protein, about being weak and needing to take all kinds of supplements. We try to clear that up but it takes a conversation,” he explained.

Ultimately, Polkowski is hopeful that if they can convince people to just try it out, they will embrace the change.

“When they experience it for themselves, that’s when the lightbulb goes off. But getting them to start is the difficult part, as it is quite challenging for the majority of people to overcome the mental hurdle.”

While Polkowski appreciates that many people remain sceptical, he said there is a mountain of evidence from reputable sources that a whole-food plant-based diet works.

“PB Health gives people the experience of doing this full-on but in a convenient way, in the hopes that they will do it in the long term.

“But any bit helps; even if you can change one meal a day, just keep at that, because your health will start improving, even though it may not be as huge a transformation.”

SPECIAL PROMO! Enjoy a 15% discount with the promo code “FMT” when ordering meals from PB Kitchen from Feb 7-28.

Sign up for PB Health’s challenge here or follow them on Facebook and Instagram.