Milk: from healthy to harmful

Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Part 3

Processed milk increases asthma and allergies

Considering the negative health effects linked to low-fat milk, should we all go back to drinking full-cream milk?

Sadly, it's not that simple. While whole milk is a healthier option than low-fat or skimmed milk, it is still subjected to processing that destroys some of its nutrients. Pasteurization typically involves heating milk for 30 seconds at 63ºC, which destroys beneficial bacteria as well as all the important enzymes that aid milk digestion. Essential vitamins and proteins are also damaged or destroyed.

Homogenization, a process that passes milk through a fine filter, causes other problems by reducing the size of fat globules by a factor of 10 or more. When protein molecules become attached to these smaller fat globules, this piggy-backing allows the proteins to bypass digestion in the stomach, which may lead to their incomplete digestion and to their causing allergic reactions.

Allergies, asthma, hay fever and 'atopic sensitization' skin problems, which have been increasing apace in the last quarter century in children drinking shop-bought, processed milk, are rare in children drinking raw, whole, unprocessed 'farm milk'.^[17] Researchers found that the timing of exposure to raw milk was critical. Those children exposed during the first year of life showed the greatest protective effect.

But we aren't allowed to buy raw milk. We're told this is because there is a risk of brucellosis. However, studies have shown that the risk of brucellosis is very low in small herds, increasing as herd size goes up.^[18] The animals' nutrition almost certainly plays a part. Small herds on fertile pasture or appropriate feed, plus regular testing, clean barns and milking machines, stainless steel tanks and refrigerated trucks all make it entirely possible to get healthy, clean, certified raw milk to the public. Tests are widely available to detect brucellosis in cattle, goats and sheep, and modern science makes brucellosis-free herds easily possible.

It is the alternative — pasteurized, processed milk from large herds crowded into barns and given hormones and antibiotics — which causes allergy problems for an increasing number of people. How many customers does the dairy industry have to lose to putative 'milk allergies' before it sees the light and opts for quality rather than quantity — for thousands of prosperous small dairies delivering directly to the consumer as in my youth, rather than small numbers of huge herds, confined to barns and producing dirty milk that must have its vital elements destroyed by pasteurization and processing?

Rather than avoiding all dairy products altogether, a more sensible option would be to consume milk in its most natural state: raw, unprocessed and full-fat — if you can find it. I can't, so I drink only cream.

But what about calcium?

Milk is touted as a great natural source of calcium, and we are told to eat plenty of calcium to prevent osteoporosis, or thinning of the bones. Sadly, eating available dairy products can increase the rate at which calcium is lost from the body and so hasten calcium deficiency diseases.

A recent meta-analysis found that a low intake of milk was not associated with any important increase in fracture risk in either men or women.^[19]

Bureaucracy costs

Organ meats are hugely nutritious, but supermarkets don't sell them. Looking to source organs from local farmers, I recently discovered how difficult it can be to get them, as many who used to sell them now refuse to sell any organ-meats. Some told me that the main reason was that they had to pay a minimum of £100 per hour to both EU and UK vets in order for their meats to pass inspection, so it wasn't worth their while having the organ-meats inspected as well. Others said that the vets insisted on throwing away the organ meats. Either way, it's a criminal waste.

Conclusion

Milk should be, and could be, an important food source. It would be a shame to give it up. But current dietary dogma and processing methods have ruined it as a healthy food at this time.

Low-fat milk, milk processing and the other dietary modifications to make animal fats 'healthier' are crimes against nature.

But they aren't the only ones. There are many examples — from genetic modification to hormone controls, to developing animals such as Belgian Blue cattle that have double muscles and are too big to be born other than by Caesarian section — which are unnatural, dangerous and expensive. And with only one aim: to produce leaner meat.

In our arrogant tinkering with natural foods to make them 'healthier', we have inadvertently created a health crisis not only for ourselves but for our farm animals.

How long will it be before we learn that whenever we attempt to 'improve' on Nature, we end up paying for it with our health?

And when food is already so expensive, why overload the system with exorbitant costs?

References

17.Riedler J, et al. Exposure to farming in early life and development of asthma and allergy: a cross-sectional survey Lancet 2001; 358: 1129-1133.
18.Mikolon AB, et al. Risk factors for brucellosis seropositivity of goat herds in the Mexicali Valley of Baja California, Mexico. Prev Vet Med 1998; 37: 185-195.
19.Kanis JA, et al. A meta-analysis of milk intake and fracture risk: low utility for case finding. Osteoporos Int 2005; 16: 799-804.

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Last updated 28 September 2008