Thursday, January 25, 2007

So, Milk Does A Body Good Huh? Read And Decide For Yourself.

You've seen the milk mustache, you've guzzled it down after a peanut-butter & jelly sandwich. But, is drinking the milk from a cow really good for you? You should know, right off the bat, that we humans are the only species on earth that drinks milk in adulthood. We are also the only species that drinks milk from another species. Now, look at a cow, then look at a human and ask yourself if they look like they would have the same nutritional requirements?

Personally, I have an allergy to milk protein and I am moderately lactose intolerant. In other words, my body is telling me to stop drinking milk and stop eating milk based products. About 12 years ago, I stopped drinking milk. About 6 years ago, I stopped eating milk based ice cream and about 2 years ago I started using soy milk in coffee & tea. I’ve since stopped coffee as well. August 30, 2006 I stopped all dairy products with the only exception being eggs. So, milk isn’t high on my list at all and a recent study apparently highlights some possible adverse effects. If you ad milk to tea or coffee, you may want to read about this. Especially if you make even a small effort to be healthy.

A recent article on Yahoo: Milk Destroys Health Benefits of Tea (paraphrased here) highlights a German study that reports that when women drank half a liter of tea, their arteries relaxed significantly more than when they drank hot water or tea with milk( milk being 10% of the drink’s volume). In the study on 16 women ages 50+, drinking black Darjeeling tea; the researchers placed ultrasound probes on their forearm to measure the arterial responses.

Tea has complex antioxidant compounds called polyphenols which are believed to help the arteries to relax or dilate, thus enabling a smoother flow of blood. The results were confirmed via lab-dish tests on the aorta of rats. The study in the European Heart Journal points the finger of blame at 3 milk casein proteins. These milk proteins adhere to the polyphenols (the good antioxidants in tea known as catechins) and prevent them from carrying out their healthful duties. One of the researchers point out that in England, where tea is consumed in abundance, they continue to have difficulty making headway with cardiovascular disease. A very interesting implication isn't it? Well, we know the tea is healthy.

Rachelle Strauss in her on-line article Is Dairy The Best Source of Calcium, points out the other side (the side I believe) of the “Milk Does Your Body Good” controversy. I suggest you read it and decide for yourself. She makes very compelling arguments for seeking other sources of calcium.

So, if milk and milk protein containing products can destroy the health benefits of tea, what will it do to you on its own? Thought provoking isn’t it? Feel like guzzling down an 8oz glass of milk right now or are you having second thoughts?

Is milk really good for us or is this a case of the dairy industry trying its best to pull the wool over our collective eyes to sustain their business. Only you can decide for yourself. For me, since I’ve stopped dairy, I’ve stopped snoring, I’m sleeping better, no more dark rungs under my eyes and in combination with some other nutritional changes have lost weight and am feeling more energetic, more often. But that’s me. Read more on this subject and decide for yourself. Even talk to your doctor about it.

So, next time you reach for those cookies, maybe try some vanilla soy milk with them instead. I bet you'll be surprised.

Healthfully Yours,


DocT


Dr. Narson is a 2-term past president of the Florida Chiropractic Association’s Council on Sports Injuries, Physical Fitness & Rehabilitation and was honored as the recipient of the coveted Chiropractic Sports Physician of the Year Award in 1999. He practices in Miami Beach, Florida at the Miami Beach Family & Sports Chiropractic Center; A Facility for Natural Sports Medicine.



For More Information On Dr. Narson's Practice, visit: www.NaturalSportsMedicine.com

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank-you Doctor Narson for sharing some long forgotten common sense here about milk. We see a global preoccupation with consuming animal milk as if it is the panacea for nutrition, especially for children.

This is clearly not true and in fact over-consumption of milk leads to a variety of health side effects that often outweigh its nutrition value.

The problem is, that many medical sources and practitioners fail to see, or are constrained to suppress the problems associated with milk intolerances.

I suspect that there are strong marketing and political influences to maintain the myth of cow's milk being the 'perfect food' given the vast industry that relies on our consumption.

As such your insightful article here and the links you refer to provide valuable comment to redress this oversell of 'the white stuff'.

Thank you for your post here.

Richard Strauss.

Anonymous said...

If you're going to argue that "we humans are the only species on earth that drinks milk in adulthood. We are also the only species that drinks milk from another species," then one can counter-argue that we humans are the only species that cook our food - does that mean we should stop cooking our food? We humans are also the only species that process our food in any way -- I guess no noodles or pasta for me!

Dr. Todd Narson said...

As far as cooking and processing our foods.... As a species, Humans have been putting our food to the fire for about 1.7-1.9 million years. Therefor, we have evolved through time cooking our foods, albeit in a much more simple fashion than we do today. However, there are many foods, including some veggies (ie: Kale) that you need to cook a little in order to break down the cellular matrix to we can extract the nutrients that would otherwise be unavailable to us. Same goes for meats too...to a degree. Cook it too much and you'll kill the natural enzymes as well as the vitamins.

Yes, we as a species are the only ones to totally process our foods, kill all the nutrient value, the natural bacerias that help us digest, the enzymes that help us break down the foods and we're the only species with rampant cancer, diabetes, heart disease and stroke.

You can have your pasta, just realize it's not something we evolved to eat, therefore, eat it once in a while for fun, but it is certainly not a health food.

As Michael Pollan says... Eat Food (meaning real food), Mostly Plants, Not Too Much.

'nuff said.

Dr. T