Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Not Milk
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Milk builds strong bones, muscles, and teeth. We know this because the white-mustachioed celebrities have been telling us so for years. Yet new studies don’t support – and may even contradict – this seeming truism. Let the dry corn flakes stick to the roof of my mouth.
It all started hundreds of thousands of years ago. Back when modern humans first walked the African savannah, the only milk available came from human mothers (wild cattle were tough to catch and even tougher to milk). No adult drank milk until about 10,000 years ago with the advent of farming and animal domestication, and many people nowadays grow intolerant of lactose - a milk sugar - as they age. These people become bloated and gassy whenever they eat dairy, because the body produces less and less of the enzyme that breaks down the sugar. Our bodies don’t expect us to suckle past the first few years of life.
If a bloated belly were the only downside to drinking milk, we wouldn’t have much to worry about. But a few recent studies have found that people who drink lots of milk may have greater problems: cancer. A compilation of studies from 2006 found that women who consume an amount of lactose equivalent to 3 cups of milk a day are at a modestly increased risk of ovarian cancer, though the distinction was small. Another study showed that men who drank at least two glasses of milk per day had almost twice the prostate cancer risk as those who abstained from milk. Granted, these so-called “observational” studies are not precisely controlled trials comparing the cancer risk of milk-drinkers to milk-haters, but the findings should give pause to those who gulp an extra glassful to stave off osteoporosis.
Another supposed benefit of milk - weight loss - may also be fiction. Out of 49 rigorous randomized controlled trials on the subject, 41 showed no effect of milk or calcium supplementation on weight loss, while three showed weight gain and five showed weight loss. To add to the confusion, another study on thousands of Americans showed that depending on the type of dairy product, the ethnicity of the imbiber, and their gender, dairy can either increase or decrease risk of obesity. Go figure.
But, in the end, milk still builds strong bones, right? Also not so clear. Both the huge Nurses’ Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-up Study found that people who drank one glass of milk per week were at no greater risk of breaking a hip or forearm as those who drank 2+ glasses per week. And many other studies show similar results.
These studies are all still preliminary and aren’t conclusive enough yet to make broad recommendations, but the findings are fascinating in light of our culture’s focus on pushing milk, such as the Got Milk? ads (first sponsored by the California Milk Processor Board and then licensed to the National Milk Processor Board) and the 2005 USDA Dietary Guidelines that still recommend three cups a day of low- or non-fat milk for most people.
So are Oreos destined to live life sans a tall, milky mate? Americans still need enough calcium, along with vitamin D and load-bearing exercise, to prevent osteoporosis later in life. And some studies have shown that dairy products may lower risk of high blood pressure and colon cancer. But right now, some researchers, including those at the Harvard School of Public Health, say that no one really knows which source of calcium is best, and there’s no reason to believe other sources, like dark green, leafy vegetables, dried beans, salmon, or tofu, aren’t better than dairy. They say there’s no evidence supporting drinking more than one serving of milk a day along with a healthy diet packed with calcium from non-dairy sources. So keep feeding it to your kids, but, all you adults out there, shave the milk mustache.
For more information visit the Harvard School of Public Health website: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/what-should-you-eat/calcium-and-milk/index.html
Comments
Please research food related articles more thoroughly. The real health story is the benefits of raw milk. It is legal in Massachusetts to purchase raw milk directly from a raw milk dairy. Health benefits are too numerous to mention here. You could check out the Weston A. Price Foundation as a start.
Thanks.
Some of the best athletes in the world swear by milk as an post workout drink. Michael Phelps drinks 1% chocolate milk after his workouts. His team of nutritionists swear by it. Apparently it has the perfect combination of nutrients needed to fuel and repair the body.
It’s true that many physicians and nutritionists still believe milk is an important part of an adult’s diet. But it’s interesting to note that studies do show that there may be downsides to a beverage we all thought was the epitome of healthfulness, and that other foods may be better sources of calcium. It’s also interesting to note that the California Milk Processor Board, and now the National Milk Processor Board, runs the Got Milk? ads, not a health department.
It’s also worth noting that humans are the only species who drink milk past infancy and we are also the only species to drink the milk of another species. Cow’s milk is meant for BABY COWS, not humans. The reality is, most of the world’s population is lactose intolerant. Asian women (who live in Asia) have almost no osteoporis. And they don’t consume dairy whatsoever. American diets, which include dairy and excess protein, has widespread osteoporosis in older women. Incidentally, excess protein is a cause bone loss.
The only reason calcium is found in cow’s milk is because cows grazed on grass (minerals come from the ground, not from animals and calcium is a mineral). Since cows no longer graze outdoors and instead are raised on factory farms, the calcium is actually put into their feed. That is how calcium gets into dairy products.
A lot of people don’t realize that they’re allergic to dairy, because the allergic reaction is different than say, a reaction to a bee sting. The allergy to milk comes across as gas, bloating, mucus, congestion, asthma, sensitivies to outdoor allergens etc. These results are “manageable” vs. causing death, so we don’t recognize it as an allergy. In children, ear infections are usually a result of them no longer being able to digest dairy. Humans lose that ability after infancy, not necessarily as an adult or as an elderly person. http://www.kmoriarty.com
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