Milk Might Not Be Doing You Much Good

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/18/upshot/got-milk-might-not-be-doing-you-much-good.html

by mikek • 12 years ago

39 72 12 years ago

xordon• 12 years ago

Hacker News: how to drink milk like a hacker!

Use 2 hands, one on each side of the cup. Open mouth. Lift arms, remembering to keep back straight. Pour. DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK

Ask HN: How do you drink milk?

steele• 12 years ago

Show HN: iBottle & Nook-nook.js

Dewie4• 12 years ago

Is there an Emacs package to streamline this workflow?

warfangle2• 12 years ago

A fatty/protein-filled drink like milk is still better for you than what a majority of americans consume gallons of a week: carbonated high fructose corn syrup.

w1ntermute2• 12 years ago

Actually, soda sales have been tanking: http://time.com/44282/soda-sales-drop/

warfangle2• 12 years ago

If you follow it through, even though sales have dropped 3% year over year, 8.9 billion cases were sold. Each case is 192 liquid ounces. Divided by 365, divided by 316.1 million, that's still 14.8 liquid ounces per person per day - on average, about 0.8 gallons of soda per person per week. I wasn't too far off ;)

spodek2• 12 years ago

A fatty/protein-filled drink like milk is still better for you than what a majority of americans consume gallons of a week: carbonated high fructose corn syrup.

And less healthy than the water our ancestors drank exclusively for millions of years before we domesticated animals (except for babies and their mothers' milk).

w1ntermute2• 12 years ago

Actually, before the advent of farming, the water our ancestors drank was probably pretty clean, since hunter-gatherer societies had fairly low population densities.

And you can't directly compare something that causes acute disease (dirty water) with something that causes chronic disease (soda).

Dewie4• 12 years ago

Indeed; how healthy something is is measured by how long we as a species have been doing it... /s

legohead• 12 years ago

Does anyone drink milk daily? I once tried switching to chocolate milk to get rid of my addiction to Pepsi. It was going great, until about a week later, where I was having BM problems.. constipation. Then I remembered my schooling, and figured out that the milk was causing it. Today, I have accepted my addiction and just drink Pepsi :)

readerrrr3• 12 years ago

Every day with cereal for months now. I'm doing great, no problems whatsoever.

You should switch from sugary drinks to water and fruit. It takes about 3 weeks to adjust. ( and avoid chocolate milk )

themodelplumber• 12 years ago

What do you mean by adjust? Is there some withdrawal period from a product like Pepsi? Or adjust to the dissatisfying taste of water compared to sugary drinks?

vidarh6• 12 years ago

If so, he should keep in mind that "sugary drinks" include fruit juices.

The calorie contents of Pepsi is not that far removed from many fruit juice products. Some, like lemonades, can often be higher in sugars than Pepsi.

vidarh6• 12 years ago

About a litre or so daily, sometimes more. Then again levels of lactose tolerance in southern parts of Scandinavia here I'm from is amongst the highest in the world.

I didn't really realise lactose intolerance was a thing until I was in mid 20's and moved to the UK.

Dewie4• 12 years ago

I didn't really realise lactose intolerance was a thing until I was in mid 20's and moved to the UK.

Many probably don't realize it until they "acquire" it themselves. Or maybe they just start feeling bloated after drinking a lot of milk or eating ice cream, and don't really consider that it might be a mild intolerance.

nly2• 12 years ago

Similar. Until my early 20s I thought lactose intolerance was an unfortunate allergy of some kind. My mind was blown when I discovered the majority of humans on Earth are intolerant to some degree. It often makes me wonder what other simple realities to which I am completely ignorant.

trhway• 12 years ago

colder climate -> bigger body is beneficial -> need bigger stronger bones -> milk as an efficient and stable source of calcium. I'm from Russia and also wasn't aware until few years ago that lactose intolerance is a norm on planet Earth, not an exception.

withdavidli• 12 years ago

Coca Cola FTW!!!

As for milk... could always tolerate it cold, but not heated (mom microwaves it). Looks like more than half the human population is lactose intolerant:

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...

Milk commercials are so over the top, in bay area radio commercials depict it for people growing up into super heroes (I kid you not).

lnanek2• 12 years ago

I used to drink many cups a day (too lazy to eat) for years. I've been avoiding it the past couple months, however, to clear up some inflammation issues (arthritis, psoriasis, etc.). They did go away, but I dropped a lot of other things from my diet too (grain/rice, seeds, nuts, nightshade family vegetables, dairy) so no clue what was actually the problem.

ufmace• 12 years ago

I used to drink soda and sugary fruit juices for every meal for years, up until about 5 years or so ago. I noticed that I was starting to gain weight, so I got rid of it all, and switched to drinking pretty much all water, with some milk and alcohol as desired. Now, I drink sugary drinks maybe like once every few weeks at most.

It does feel a little weird for the first week or two, but after about a month, I was pretty used to it, and sodas taste kinda over-sugared now.

My diet advice, for what it's worth - if you do nothing else, dump sugary drinks, including soda, fruit juices, energy drinks, etc in favor of water. It's pretty easy as long as you don't try to change everything else at the same time, and every school of thought on nutrition I'm aware of agrees that they're awful. It's also kinda nice to not have to carry everything you drink home from the store.

icpmacdo• 12 years ago

I use to drink a fair amount of juice a few years ago. I am almost 100% off sugary drink now. The way I got off of it was drinking about twice as much water as juice but for some reason it was only effective when it was ice cold to stop the early cravings. I got an insulated water bottle that was around 2 and a half liter's and it worked out well.

I need to do find some similar method to stop eating bread now :)

spodek2• 12 years ago

Why would anyone think drinking the milk of another animal, evolved to grow calves, not people?

The article's second-to-last paragraph tells you everything. We believe in milk because it's profitable for diary producers to promote it, which they do.

Politics are certainly at play here [...] the vast majority of Dairy Management’s funding for its marketing strategies comes from the producers themselves. The U.S.D.A.'s role in promoting dairy was firmly established in the 1983 Dairy Production and Stabilization Act, which made it the business of the government to carry out a “coordinated program of promotion designed to strengthen the dairy industry’s position in the marketplace and to maintain and expand domestic and foreign markets and uses for fluid milk and dairy products.”

revelation• 12 years ago

Because it turns out God didn't handcraft every single one of us and there is considerable overlap between the needs of calves and that of humans. So maybe "milk is good for you" is another marketing ploy like the KFC christmas in Japan or Coca-Cola. I'm pretty sure sugary drinks are still worse in comparison, though.

scott_s5• 12 years ago

Because it is a convenient food source, for those that can digest it. Being able to digest lactose is more common in people whose ancestors domesticated cows. Human evolution has not stopped; the ability for some people to digest lactose into adulthood is a recent adaptation, which happened after we domesticated cows and had a convenient food source available, aside from their meat.

A cow's liver also serves a very specific evolutionary purpose for the cow, but I've never seen anyone say, "Why would anyone think of eating a cow's liver, evolved to detoxify the cow, not feed people?"

svalorzen• 12 years ago

Well, I'm pretty sure nothing I eat specifically evolved to be eaten by me. Guess what, I eat anyway.

delecti3• 12 years ago

Well that depends on whether you consider what we do to plants "evolution".

guyzero4• 12 years ago

Milk was "evolved" about the same way wheat "evolved" - which is to say, it was created through over thousands of years of selective breeding. Modern milk is pretty carefully engineered to give very specific percentages of fat, protein and sugars by way of the way cattle are bred and selected. Modern milk is about as "evolved" as a ham sandwich.

scott_s5• 12 years ago

What I take away from this is that milk does not provide any particular benefits over other food. Which does not mean there's necessarily anything wrong with it.

Personally, I was a long-time vegetarian, and am now a pescetarian. I am also a very active person, training in power lifting and Brazilian jiu jitsu several times a week. I drink whole milk daily because it is calorie and protein dense, not because I think it has some magical properties.

latch3• 12 years ago

   Which does not mean there's necessarily anything wrong with it.

If it's nutritionally mundane, we should base our decision on other factors: environmental impact, sustainability and animal cruelty. In Australia, 400K-700 calves (< 30 days old) are sent to the slaughterhouse every year in order to sustain its milk industry.

scott_s5• 12 years ago

I don't think it is actually nutritionally neutral, as it is calorie and protein dense. Hence, why I drink it. But I don't ascribe any magical properties to it.

I do agree with your overall point, as ethical reasons where why I was a vegetarian for ten years. But going vegan was, personally, a bridge too far. My quality of life was impacted too much by removing eggs and dairy as they were my main sources of protein - and still are.

ahh• 12 years ago

...to produce delicious veal, presumably?

More to the point: if we didn't drink the milk of the mothers, neither the mothers nor the calves would exist at all; we wouldn't maintain millions of head of cattle for nostalgia. I'm not at all clear that's morally superior.

guyzero4• 12 years ago

The conclusion is sort of weak - that milk isn't strictly necessary and doesn't do much good for you because most Americans aren't vitamin- or calorie- deficient.

That logic could be applied to literally anything. Is beef good for you? Most Americans aren't protein deficient and beef has a lot of saturated fat in it. Is chicken good for you? Most Americans aren't protein deficient. Are carrots good for you? Most Americans aren't Vitamin A-deficient. etc.

Milk is fine. Not everyone can tolerate it. You don't need to drink a gallon a day to stay alive. But it's a perfectly fine part of a normal diet. And for kids who are sometimes fussy eaters, yeah, milk can actually make the difference between getting enough calories or not.

imanaccount2477• 12 years ago

The difference is what happens if you take them away. Most Americans aren't vitamin A deficient because of carrots. If you removed carrots, you would end up with a huge explosion of vitamin A deficiency. If you removed milk, nothing would happen. And the notion that meat is simply protein is not accurate. Meat is a primary source of a few vitamins and minerals for many people (b12, zinc, iron, etc). The protein is not what makes it good, pretty much anything that a reasonable person would classify as "real food" contains plenty enough protein.

guyzero4• 12 years ago

Vitamin D is added to milk because before they did that there were a lot of people with Vitamin D deficiency. The same thing is true of iodine in salt.

Most people can remove any one or two things from their diet and they won't suddenly get scurvy or pellagra.

tiglionabbit5• 12 years ago

Exactly! Vegans have no choice but to take supplements for these vitamins.

therealdrag02• 12 years ago

Healthcare Triage has a video on milk being not particularly healthy or even beneficial in ways people think: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzyFZcuHmeI

OrwellianChild2• 12 years ago

And, in case this isn't clear to everyone, Aaron Carroll is the author of both the NYT article and the man in front of the camera at Healthcare Triage.

I think that Healthcare Triage does a pretty excellent job of presenting information. Just don't want anyone to consider them separate sources, as it's the same guy. :)

therealdrag02• 12 years ago

Haha. Oops. I didn't notice that. I wouldn't have posted this if I had. Thanks for pointing that out.

leeber• 12 years ago

This is not really "news" at all. I stopped drinking dairy milk a couple years ago because I realized it offered no potential benefits, and only alleged risks that kept surfacing in these studies.

There is literally no up-side to drinking milk, only purported risks. Thus, IMO the only reason to drink it is if you REALLY REALLY REALLY like the taste and can't imagine your life without it.

Also, interestingly - I personally have seen absolutely zero studies that showed milk benefits, that was not funded by the dairy farmers.

guyzero4• 12 years ago

Of course there's an upside to drinking milk - it has calories and nutrients. Is it a better source of those two things than anything else? No. But there is no "perfect" food - you need a little bit of everything.

heurist• 12 years ago

It's great for gaining weight (which is something a lot of people want to do).

nly2• 12 years ago

But there’s very little evidence that most adults need it. There’s also very little evidence that it’s doing them much good.

Isn't all foodstuff this way? I watched a BBC documentary a number of years ago about a woman who had reportedly lived entirely on crisps (potato chips) for years[0]. She wasn't entirely healthy by any means, but it speaks to the resilience of our biology when you can get by on basically anything provided you get enough calories and a few vitamins.

Once you get past a bit of common sense, the whole notion of "healthy food" and "unhealthy food" often looks pretty ridiculous. It's really not worth time debating the negligible pros and cons of one particular food item.

Disclaimer: I've been drinking a pint of semi-skimmed every night since I was a child... which according to Wolfram Alpha is almost a quarter of the volume of a Gray Whale

[0] http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/feb/12/eaten-on...

delecti3• 12 years ago

Incidentally, she probably only survived because potatoes are very nearly nutritionally complete.

I've read that you can survive indefinitely on a diet of potatoes and milk. I don't remember a specific source, but a quick google search seems to back that up.

CompelTechnic• 12 years ago

In addition, milk is not a low-calorie beverage. Even if people drink nonfat milk, three cups a day can mean an additional 250 calories consumed. Low-fat or whole milk has even more calories. In an era when every other caloric beverage is being marginalized because of obesity concerns, it’s odd that milk continues to get a pass.

I'm kind of upset that this is an argument here. It's as if the author thinks that because you drink a beverage instead of eat it, it can't make you any less hungry, and therefore you keep on eating and drinking and get fat.

If anything, when I drink a glass of milk I feel more satiated (less hungry) than I would for a lot of foods. Beverages can definitely make you feel full.

In addition, I've seen a good amount of evidence that protein (in milk or other foods) produces more satiation per unit calorie than carbs or fat. I'm too lazy to cite my sources right now, but a google search shows some merit to the idea that milk helps you lose weight.

vidarh6• 12 years ago

There's a very clear correlation for me between my protein intake and how well I do at the gym (power lifting), and I hate it. Getting optimal levels of protein for me, which seems to be around the 200g/day level, is hard. Towards dinner time I hate the sight of food...

tiglionabbit5• 12 years ago

Have you tried eating more fat? I've heard that, by gram, muscles are made mostly of fat, then carbs, and then a little bit of protein.

tiglionabbit5• 12 years ago

I'm kind of upset that anyone things drinking low-fat or skim milk is a good idea. Milk contains many fat-soluble nutrients. If you remove the fat, you remove the nutrients.

Instead of low-fat milk, we should drink low-sugar milk. It is the milk sugar, lactose, that many people are intolerant to. If you want to get a feeling for how much sugar is in milk, try lactose free milk some time. It is made by introducing lactase which breaks the complex lactose down into simple galactose, and it tastes like a bowl of lucky charms.

Recently I have switched to drinking half-and-half instead, when I want some milk. I may even try out heavy cream eventually. Half and half has less sugar and more fat than whole milk. Consuming fat is a great way to dampen the glycemic index of sugary foods, so I think heavy cream or half and half is a much better mate to cookies than regular milk would be.

whole milk: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/dairy-and-egg-products/6... half and half: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/dairy-and-egg-products/4... heavy cream: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/dairy-and-egg-products/5...

imanaccount2477• 12 years ago

Your link says you are mistaken. Milk has only a few vitamins and minerals in reasonable quantities. They are still there in skim milk, and still just as available. None of them are fat soluble other than the vitamin D if you are consuming milk with vitamin D added to it. Compare whole milk from your link to skim milk from the same site: http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/dairy-and-egg-products/1...

imanaccount2477• 12 years ago

In addition, I've seen a good amount of evidence that protein (in milk or other foods) produces more satiation per unit calorie than carbs or fat

Evidence, or "fad diet claims"? Because the only actual satiety testing I've seen does not support the keto mythology on the subject. In fact, boiled potatoes come out 50% higher in satiety than beef. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7498104

jack-r-abbit• 12 years ago

I don't really drink milk very often. I rarely ever just have a glass of it. I have a bowl of cereal like 2-3 times a month (but really only because it is there for the kids). I don't think I would miss it in liquid form if it was suddenly unavailable. However, it is in a lot of things I eat: cheese, yogurt, sour cream, chocolate, pan cakes, etc. So on one hand, it is a little strange that humans are the only animal to drink the milk of another animal and to drink milk of any kind past infancy. But on the other hand, products made out of milk seem as natural and appropriate as products made out of hamburger.

carsongross• 12 years ago

This certainly does not apply to everyone, but if you are trying to get strong, Mark Rippetoe recommends a gallon of milk a day, which lead to this hilarious exchange:

Rip: You need to drink one gallon of full fat milk everyday. It's almost mandatory.

Audience Member: I'm lactose intolerant, could I substitute yogurt for milk?

Rip: Gallon of yogurt.

Milk Might Not Be Doing You Much Good

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