Got Milk? You've got problems

[shockra]

August 13, 2005

Got milk? You've got problems

By Karen Dawn, KAREN DAWN runs the animal advocacy media watch DawnWatch.com and is a contributor to "In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave" (Blackwell Publishing, 2005).

DAIRY COWS have overtaken automobiles as the No. 1 air polluter in parts of California, according to a Los Angeles Times article. A New York Times editorial discussed "the eye-stinging, nose-burning smell of cattle congestion in rural California," acknowledging that something had to be done. What nobody wants to say, in this land of milk and cookies, is that we shouldn't be drinking cow's milk.

In the last edition of his "Baby and Child Care" bible, Dr. Benjamin Spock made it clear that cow's milk is for baby cows, not for human children. He wrote that it was "too rich in the saturated fats that cause artery blockages" and that it "slows down iron absorption." He suggested that it may cause ear and/or respiratory problems, and may be linked to childhood onset diabetes. He stressed that infants should drink only human breast milk and older children should try soy and rice milk products.

But the dairy industry would rather you didn't know that. As it spends millions of dollars telling us that milk consumption will help us lose weight, it would rather we didn't see a study published in the June issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. The study found that children who drink more than three servings of milk daily are prone to becoming overweight, even if it is low-fat milk. Neither does the industry advertise the Harvard School of Public Health finding that 15% of whites, 70% of African Americans and 90% of Asians are lactose intolerant.

The dairy industry prefers to scare us with tales of brittle bones, hoping we don't notice studies showing that people in Asia, who consume almost no dairy products, have a significantly lower rate of hip fractures than people in "got milk?" America. Consistent with those results is Harvard University's 1997 Nurses Health Study, which followed 78,000 women over a 12-year period and found that those who consumed the most dairy foods broke the most bones.

more...

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-dawn13aug13,0,4920117.story

[Hun Joro]

1. Excellent!

Most people don't realize that the nutritional information we get about dairy is nothing more than advertising.

[peacebuzzard]

2. Thanks to all the info I get from here I have drastically reduced milk &

its by-products. It makes an immediate difference. Hard to incorporate, but easy on the body.

[RebelOne]

3. I really love milk, but now stick to soy milk.

But I do have a weakness for ice cream. I have had ice cream made from soy and it is delicious, but not all the grocery stores in my neighborhood carry it. And you cannot get it in 1/2-gallon containers wherever it is sold. I prefer the 1/2-gallon containers because when I have ice cream, I eat a lot of it.

[NMMNG]

4. The component in dairy products that promoted weight loss

in the studies referred to by all of those ads was calcium. You don't need to consume dairy products to get calcium. Of course the dairy promoters won't tell you that....

[flamingyouth]

5. Great article

Thanks for posting. :thumbsup:

Now I know why I would often throw up when I was a kid after drinking a glass of milk. The stuff is just foul. I finally kicked the cheese and ice cream habit a couple of months ago and have never felt better.

I actually ate a couple of small cheese pizza slices while I was on vacation (long story, but it was the only food available and I was starving) and ended up really, really sick afterward. :puke: