Is milk bad for you??

Many people in the world- the majority of asian people ,for example - are lactose intolerant.

For these people milk would be bad.

For the rest of us, it is perfectly fine - in moderation and not to the exclusion of other nutrients, of course - but that goes for any food.

Incidentally it is possible for people to manage milk fine for most of their life and then develop intolerance.

My father, who is nearly 80, can no longer eat cereal with milk or drink iced coffees because of late onset lactose intolerance. He can have small amounts - ie one or two white coffees a day but that's it now.

If it's spoiled!!

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I don't drink milk, but I will occasionally cook with it, and I really like healthy forms of plain yogurt (I buy Stonyfield or goat whole milk yogurt, but not often), and I like cheese. I probably like good meltable cheese a little too much.


If you are not lactose intolerant, or have other digestive issues with milk, it's fine for you. In limited amounts. But I do think it is a food that is not a necessary part of one's diet, even if one can digest it past infancy. Since I do eat some forms of it, I prefer not to have it doctored for "mouthfeel" or flavor by excipients. So, I do eat the whole-milk forms. BTW, whole milk is NOT 100% fat, it is 3.5% fat on average!

I'm simply working right now on eating LESS of it (that insidious cheese form I still want to enjoy in all its melty goodness... I can do it!)

AnvilHead wrote: »

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27882862?log$=activity

@AnvilHead
Thank you for this. No one I know drinks milk; I drink 2 cups a day. I had read it doesn’t help with osteoporosis, which I have, but my bone density has increased with regular milk intake, Pilates, and increased walking/hiking.

The study you posted made me realize that milk helps the bone density but not the risk of bone fracture, which is the bad outcome of osteoporosis as far as I know.

I have also read yogurt is better than milk, which the study below supports for cancer risk. (Couldn’t find link but it’s below the article you posted, so I’m pasting that abstract here.)

Interesting the increase in whole milk & prostate cancer... I guess the jury is still out on sat fat.


Dairy products intake and cancer mortality risk: a meta-analysis of 11 population-based cohort studies.

Review article
Lu W, et al. Nutr J. 2016.
Show full citation
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Dairy products are major components of daily diet and the association between consumption of dairy products and public health issues has captured great attention. In this study, we conducted a meta-analysis to investigate the association between dairy products intake and cancer mortality risk.

METHODS: After a literature search in PubMed and EMBASE, 11 population-based cohort studies involving 778,929 individuals were considered eligible and included in the analyses. Data were extracted and the association between dairy products intake and cancer mortality risk was estimated by calculating pooled relative risks (RRs) and corresponding 95 % confidence intervals (CIs). Sensitivity analyses and subgroup analyses based on regions, genders and dairy types were performed as well. Potential dose-response relationship was further explored by adopting the generalized least squares (GLST) method.

RESULTS: Total dairy products intake was not associated with all cancer mortality risk, with the pooled RR of 0.99 (95 % CI 0.92-1.07, p = 0.893). Subgroup analyses showed that the pooled RRs were 0.97 (95 % CI 0.92-1.03, p = 0.314) for milk, 0.88 (95 % CI 0.71-1.10, p = 0.271) for yogurt, 1.23 (95 % CI 0.94-1.61, p = 0.127) for cheese and 1.13 (95 % CI 0.89-1.44, p = 0.317) for butter in male and female, however the pooled RR was 1.50 (95 % CI 1.03-2.17, p = 0.032) for whole milk in male, which was limited to prostate cancer. Further dose-response analyses were performed and we found that increase of whole milk (serving/day) induced elevated prostate cancer mortality risk significantly, with the RR of 1.43 (95 % CI 1.13-1.81, p = 0.003).

CONCLUSIONS: Total dairy products intake have no significant impact on increased all cancer mortality risk, while low total dairy intake even reduced relative risk based on the non-linear model. However, whole milk intake in men contributed to elevated prostate cancer mortality risk significantly. Furthermore, a linear dose-response relationship existed between increase of whole milk intake and increase of prostate cancer mortality risk.

Thanks again. I think I may gradually move to one cup of milk (maybe try Fairlife) & one 6 oz yogurt. I love my lattes!!

Milk is bad for you if you are lactose intolerant, which covers a lot of people. I do use full-fat milk in cooking (this is really only 3.5% fat, and better than the excipients that make up skim 0% fat to make it semi-tolerable to drink, or cook with. That being said, I don't like drinking milk as a beverage, so I only use it in recipes. I agree it better for most people, as lolly above indicated, than drinking fruit in the form of beverages/juice.

I far prefer water, unsweetened tea, SodaStream seltzer to either of the above... Oh, I do love my morning cuppa Java or two... Unfortunately, I really am having a hard time with my favorite dairy product: cheese. So much salt!!!


At least with the better brands of yogurt, one gets other and additional health benefits, assuming moderation.

NorthCascades wrote: »

If it's spoiled!!

Just curious as to your experience with spoiled milk. Did you actually drink some and it made you sick? If so, why did you do that?

I'm not lactose intolerant, so no, it's not bad for me.