The Great Milk Debate
Milk, our very first food; just the thought seems to bring comfort to our minds. It is a product embedded into North American culture, seemingly promoted by every dietician, nutritionist and health organization around. It has even earned its own spot in the chart of essential food groups. However, despite all of this, milk is not actually as good for us as health authorities have lead us to believe. If you actually think about this idea for a moment, you will begin to see why. Cow’s milk is not even close to being pure, it has been proven to contribute to many illnesses and diseases, and all in all, it just isn’t natural for humans. This leads us to great discussion and debate. Who are we to believe, the ever changing science, or our parents and grandparents who continuously told us to drink our milk so we could grow up to be big and strong. My view is, just as people thought the earth was square, they thought milk was good, but through time, developing science has lead us to uncover many new discoveries which change our opinions.
As time moves on and technology advances, we are seeing an increasing amount of milk coming out of dairy farms. This raises a concern that the milk we drink is not pure, and it has gotten increasingly worse. Unfortunately, the massive increase in quantity is not due to more effective operations, but to drugs, antibiotics, hormones, forced feeding plans, and specialized breeding. These factors are responsible for taking the average milk production of an typical dairy cow from two thousand pounds per year in the fifties, to the massive fifty thousand pounds per year today (Kradjian). This would be great if it didn’t affect the milk, but it does. The milk you drink contains traces of the drugs used to increase production, and due to the fact that these developments have been fairly recent there have been no long term studies on their effects on humans. One in particular, BGH (Bovine Growth Hormone), has even been banned in some countries because the molecules often come out in the cows lactate (Kradjian). Thankfully, Canada is one of the countries that BGH has been banned in, but what about all of the food products that we import from countries that allow it? Furthermore, what about the additives, preservatives, pasteurization and homogenization processes, hormones and steroids that are aloud in Canada? During transportation, cows frequently catch fevers. To treat the fevers in the cows, a hazardous antibiotic called Chloramphenicol is often used. In rare cases, small amounts of this antibiotic can cause blood disease and aplastic anemia (Reichenberg). Although you may never her of such a case, I don’t think the risk brings about good qualities. Perhaps a more familiar drug would help people to relate, steroids. Just like BGH, traces of steroids can also be passed through in the cows milk (Reichenberg). I don’t think I have to explain the general effects of steroids, we hear about them quite regularly. Too commonly, they are used by professional athletes, especially in sports such as bodybuilding and powerlifting, where there seems to be an obvious incentive to grow. Now, acknowledging the affects of steroids, can you relate it to a current concern in today’s adolescents reaching puberty? In many cases, the young milk drinkers of today are reaching puberty far before they were meant to, and bodily growth seems to have lost any sort of consistent pattern. Then there is a little thing I like to call the vampire factor. As if all the drugs and chemicals weren’t enough, cow’s milk contains blood! I’m not just talking about a tiny molecule in a large glass; I’m talking about up to one and a half million white blood cells in only one milliliter of milk! That’s the equivalent to only one-thirtieth of an ounce (Kradjian)! These numbers are even aloud by the USDA! Cows are also constantly getting infections around their udders. These infections are treated with ointments and antibiotics, and the cows are still continuously milked. Pus from the infection then gets into the milk and is mixed in with milk collected from other cows. This brings up another problem. Through pooling the milk, contaminated milk is diluted with more milk, further spreading the contamination. A chilling example of this is the bovine Leukemia virus, a virus that can be found in three out of five dairy cows in the United States. This means that even though sixty percent of the cows milked directly contain the virus, after it is pooled, up to ninety-five percent of the milk is contaminated (Kradjian). Fortunately, pasteurization kills the virus, if all goes as planned that is, but I don’t find it too comforting that the milk I drink was once a cocktail of viruses and drugs. To end this off, when the milk is quality tested by their method only tests for two of the thirty or so drugs that may be found in milk, and again, the procedure is lax, for their needs to be fairly high levels present for the drug to even register in the test (Kradjian).
Yet another downfall to dairy products, and perhaps one of the most shocking, is one that is often never thought of. Excess or even small amounts of dairy products can lead to illness and even disease. I believe it would be safe to say that we all know someone, if it isn’t yourself who is in some way negatively affected by dairy products. It is even said that dairy products are second place on the charts for causing food related illness. As I say, milk is for babies. The reason why so many people have troubles digesting dairy is simply because they lose the ability to metabolize lactose, the main carbohydrate in milk, by the age of five (Kradjian). This is known as lactose intolerance. Many people are deficient in lactase which is the enzyme needed to digest lactose (Reichenberg). To lactose intolerant people, consuming dairy products can lead to gas, bloating, and bad cramps. Then there are dairy allergies, which is different from lactose intolerance. Dairy allergies often are the result of premature introduction to milk products. The digestive system of a newborn human baby is not as well equipped to handle cows milk especially the milk protein (Reichenberg). When dairy products are prematurely introduced, an allergy may develop for the infant, such as in the form of an ear infection, asthma and rashes (Reichenberg). However, this sensitivity to dairy can continue throughout ones entire life! Problems linked to the milk may include migraines, digestive problems, and studies have even shown a link to rheumatoid arthritis (Reichenberg). I know many people with dairy allergies, and although they are not as serious as to cause rheumatoid arthritis, they sure do put a large damper on the person’s ability to eat common foods. Our society has grown around dairy. Food industries love the stuff! What else can provide the same sweet thick and creamy texture for treats like ice cream and chocolate? It seems that its use has become so normal in our society, that the side affects are also seemingly normal, and nobody can find the sense to relate it back to the milk; or maybe they don’t want to, after all, who would give up all those dairy delicacies? But moving on to a more serious note, milk has also been linked to many more common diseases. Some of these diseases are linked to milk it self, but others can be linked to what is now added to the milk. Remember Bovine Growth Hormone? BGH manufactured by a company called Mansanto has been recorded to increase a dairy cow’s milk production by up to twenty-five percent (Cassel)! I would hate to spoil your views on the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) but they approved this genetically engineered hormone! Although this hormone does not cause cancer, it speeds up its growth. In a recent study, women with the highest levels of IGF-1 (also known as BGH) increased their risk of breast cancer by seven times! It also showed that men with the highest levels of IGF-1 had four times the risk of prostate cancer (Cassel). Then there have been studies that linked heart disease, obesity and even osteoporosis to dairy consumption (Reichenberg). Yes, to all those who have been drinking milk to prevent osteoporosis, milk is actually working to your disadvantage. Of course milk is loaded with calcium, but the question that everyone has forgotten to ask is can we as humans use this calcium? The answer is no. Many studies have shown that excessive amounts of dairy interfere with the calcium’s absorption, and the disproportionate amount of protein is in fact a major cause of osteoporosis. It seems that we North Americans have gotten all caught up in the idea that milk is the only source of calcium, but ill give you a point to ponder. If milk were the only good calcium source, than how does every other animal on this planet build healthy strong bones and in many cases, much larger than ours without drinking a drop of milk past infancy? They get it from where we should get it, leafy green vegetation. However, even carnivores have strong bone structures, which lead us to the inconvenient truth; that only we humans chose not to eat natural foods for our species, leading us to our increasing osteoporosis rates (Kradjian).
Milk, our very first food; just the thought seems to bring comfort to our minds. It is a product embedded into North American culture, seemingly promoted by every dietician, nutritionist and health organization around. It has even earned its own spot in the chart of essential food groups. However, despite all of this, milk is not actually as good for us as health authorities have lead us to believe. If you actually think about this idea for a moment, you will begin to see why. Cow’s milk is not even close to being pure, it has been proven to contribute to many illnesses and diseases, and all in all, it just isn’t natural for humans. This leads us to great discussion and debate. Who are we to believe, the ever changing science, or our parents and grandparents who continuously told us to drink our milk so we could grow up to be big and strong. My view is, just as people thought the earth was square, they thought milk was good, but through time, developing science has lead us to uncover many new discoveries which change our opinions.
As time moves on and technology advances, we are seeing an increasing amount of milk coming out of dairy farms. This raises a concern that the milk we drink is not pure, and it has gotten increasingly worse. Unfortunately, the massive increase in quantity is not due to more effective operations, but to drugs, antibiotics, hormones, forced feeding plans, and specialized breeding. These factors are responsible for taking the average milk production of an typical dairy cow from two thousand pounds per year in the fifties, to the massive fifty thousand pounds per year today (Kradjian). This would be great if it didn’t affect the milk, but it does. The milk you drink contains traces of the drugs used to increase production, and due to the fact that these developments have been fairly recent there have been no long term studies on their effects on humans. One in particular, BGH (Bovine Growth Hormone), has even been banned in some countries because the molecules often come out in the cows lactate (Kradjian). Thankfully, Canada is one of the countries that BGH has been banned in, but what about all of the food products that we import from countries that allow it? Furthermore, what about the additives, preservatives, pasteurization and homogenization processes, hormones and steroids that are aloud in Canada? During transportation, cows frequently catch fevers. To treat the fevers in the cows, a hazardous antibiotic called Chloramphenicol is often used. In rare cases, small amounts of this antibiotic can cause blood disease and aplastic anemia (Reichenberg). Although you may never her of such a case, I don’t think the risk brings about good qualities. Perhaps a more familiar drug would help people to relate, steroids. Just like BGH, traces of steroids can also be passed through in the cows milk (Reichenberg). I don’t think I have to explain the general effects of steroids, we hear about them quite regularly. Too commonly, they are used by professional athletes, especially in sports such as bodybuilding and powerlifting, where there seems to be an obvious incentive to grow. Now, acknowledging the affects of steroids, can you relate it to a current concern in today’s adolescents reaching puberty? In many cases, the young milk drinkers of today are reaching puberty far before they were meant to, and bodily growth seems to have lost any sort of consistent pattern. Then there is a little thing I like to call the vampire factor. As if all the drugs and chemicals weren’t enough, cow’s milk contains blood! I’m not just talking about a tiny molecule in a large glass; I’m talking about up to one and a half million white blood cells in only one milliliter of milk! That’s the equivalent to only one-thirtieth of an ounce (Kradjian)! These numbers are even aloud by the USDA! Cows are also constantly getting infections around their udders. These infections are treated with ointments and antibiotics, and the cows are still continuously milked. Pus from the infection then gets into the milk and is mixed in with milk collected from other cows. This brings up another problem. Through pooling the milk, contaminated milk is diluted with more milk, further spreading the contamination. A chilling example of this is the bovine Leukemia virus, a virus that can be found in three out of five dairy cows in the United States. This means that even though sixty percent of the cows milked directly contain the virus, after it is pooled, up to ninety-five percent of the milk is contaminated (Kradjian). Fortunately, pasteurization kills the virus, if all goes as planned that is, but I don’t find it too comforting that the milk I drink was once a cocktail of viruses and drugs. To end this off, when the milk is quality tested by their method only tests for two of the thirty or so drugs that may be found in milk, and again, the procedure is lax, for their needs to be fairly high levels present for the drug to even register in the test (Kradjian).
Yet another downfall to dairy products, and perhaps one of the most shocking, is one that is often never thought of. Excess or even small amounts of dairy products can lead to illness and even disease. I believe it would be safe to say that we all know someone, if it isn’t yourself who is in some way negatively affected by dairy products. It is even said that dairy products are second place on the charts for causing food related illness. As I say, milk is for babies. The reason why so many people have troubles digesting dairy is simply because they lose the ability to metabolize lactose, the main carbohydrate in milk, by the age of five (Kradjian). This is known as lactose intolerance. Many people are deficient in lactase which is the enzyme needed to digest lactose (Reichenberg). To lactose intolerant people, consuming dairy products can lead to gas, bloating, and bad cramps. Then there are dairy allergies, which is different from lactose intolerance. Dairy allergies often are the result of premature introduction to milk products. The digestive system of a newborn human baby is not as well equipped to handle cows milk especially the milk protein (Reichenberg). When dairy products are prematurely introduced, an allergy may develop for the infant, such as in the form of an ear infection, asthma and rashes (Reichenberg). However, this sensitivity to dairy can continue throughout ones entire life! Problems linked to the milk may include migraines, digestive problems, and studies have even shown a link to rheumatoid arthritis (Reichenberg). I know many people with dairy allergies, and although they are not as serious as to cause rheumatoid arthritis, they sure do put a large damper on the person’s ability to eat common foods. Our society has grown around dairy. Food industries love the stuff! What else can provide the same sweet thick and creamy texture for treats like ice cream and chocolate? It seems that its use has become so normal in our society, that the side affects are also seemingly normal, and nobody can find the sense to relate it back to the milk; or maybe they don’t want to, after all, who would give up all those dairy delicacies? But moving on to a more serious note, milk has also been linked to many more common diseases. Some of these diseases are linked to milk it self, but others can be linked to what is now added to the milk. Remember Bovine Growth Hormone? BGH manufactured by a company called Mansanto has been recorded to increase a dairy cow’s milk production by up to twenty-five percent (Cassel)! I would hate to spoil your views on the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) but they approved this genetically engineered hormone! Although this hormone does not cause cancer, it speeds up its growth. In a recent study, women with the highest levels of IGF-1 (also known as BGH) increased their risk of breast cancer by seven times! It also showed that men with the highest levels of IGF-1 had four times the risk of prostate cancer (Cassel). Then there have been studies that linked heart disease, obesity and even osteoporosis to dairy consumption (Reichenberg). Yes, to all those who have been drinking milk to prevent osteoporosis, milk is actually working to your disadvantage. Of course milk is loaded with calcium, but the question that everyone has forgotten to ask is can we as humans use this calcium? The answer is no. Many studies have shown that excessive amounts of dairy interfere with the calcium’s absorption, and the disproportionate amount of protein is in fact a major cause of osteoporosis. It seems that we North Americans have gotten all caught up in the idea that milk is the only source of calcium, but ill give you a point to ponder. If milk were the only good calcium source, than how does every other animal on this planet build healthy strong bones and in many cases, much larger than ours without drinking a drop of milk past infancy? They get it from where we should get it, leafy green vegetation. However, even carnivores have strong bone structures, which lead us to the inconvenient truth; that only we humans chose not to eat natural foods for our species, leading us to our increasing osteoporosis rates (Kradjian).
There is one main point and question that is often overlooked and has come up throughout these arguments. Is drinking bovine milk even natural? Well, as you may believe now the answer is definitely no. if we can come to accept the idea of drinking cows milk, than why can’t we just as easily accept the idea of drinking milk from a dog, cat, or even a rat? The principals are the same; the only difference is the animal’s ability to produce different quantities. The only reason why we as humans have chosen the cow was because of its potential large yield of milk, and its docile nature. Cow’s milk is no better suited for human consumption or growth compared to many other animals lactate. In fact, cow’s milk may even be among the worst. Just compare a human limb to the limb of a cow. It is easy to see that we require much more advanced and specific development and motor skills, incomparable to the bulky limb of a cow. The neurological development of a human is also highly dependant on proper and essential nutrients. We don’t have the primary need to grow as large in bone or muscle mass, or grow as quickly as a calf. This is why human mothers milk has up to ten times as much of the essential fatty acids, and in particular, linoleic acid. We don’t need the five to seven times the mineral content as found in cows milk (Kradjian). Furthermore, and on top of the fact that cow’s milk isn’t suitable for proper human development, why do we even drink milk past infancy? Milk is meant to be a short term source of nutrients for new-borns (Kradjian). Compare this to other mammals, the mother will only provide milk to the young for a very short time period, then will wean the young off to proper foods. Is nature not trying to tell us something? As I will say yet again, milk is for babies, and after weaning, it is time to go on to real proper foods, not back to milk, the liquid nutrient that was provided for us when we were unable to chew.
We live in a changing world. Change in styles, weather, and passions. Why can’t the idea of dairy change with it? Is it the only thing in this world that science has proven changed, yet we remain persistent to keep it the way it was? One thing that milk has in fact done is reveal human attachment. Milk is not pure, it causes illness and disease, and it is far from natural, yet we are relentless to keep it on our menus. It seems that the only solid reason we have for eating dairy products today is that it tastes good. In the everyday hustle bustle of North America, people can’t do without their smooth cream in coffee, the comfort of chocolate, or that refreshing taste of cold ice cream on a hot summer’s day. Embedded into our culture it is, and perhaps ever shall be; milk, our first food.
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