Many of us grew up thinking milk was good for the bones.
Milk was supposed to be a good source of calcium and vitamins, which we needed for bone health and for strong teeth.
Drinking milk was supposed to keep kids from getting cavities and protect the elderly from developing osteoporosis.
As a mostly vegan child I would learn all the different vegan sources of calcium I could tell the school nurse about so they did not need to worry about my bone health.
Almonds, broccoli, soy milk, spinach, beans, lentils, nuts, seeds, and so on…
Now, let’s not get into the argument about why it is weird to drink cow’s milk (or any other animal’s for that matter). I’ll do that in another post.
This post is about whether dairy is bad for you.
What you think you know about milk may be false
For one thing, the main driver for why people drink milk in the first place – denser bones – may be completely untrue. Countries that drink the most milk, also have the highest rate of hip fracture1.
Milk consumption correlates with higher rates of osteoporosis2. This seemingly contradictory phenomenon is thought to be caused by the milk increasing the blood’s acidity.
Scientists believe that the body may sacrifice calcium – a naturally alkaline mineral – to help balance out the blood’s pH levels and combat the acidity. This calcium will then be excreted and leads to deficiency in the bone.
Milk also contains D-galactose – a type of sugar associated with ageing3. Now, that’s not exactly appealing is it.
There is basically nothing good about dairy products
Aside from milk being a source of calcium… dairy is not really anything nutritionally unique. Sure, cheese has a lot of sodium, saturated fat and cholesterol, which we know are really good at promoting the risk of stroke and heart disease.
Around 70% of the world’s adult population is naturally lactose intolerant and avoid milk and dairy products for this reason.
All this sort of begs the question of, why are we using dairy if we don’t have to?
Why do we still drink milk?
Probably, down to habit.
Milk is not just a kids’ drink – it is consumed in coffee, tea, hot chocolate, in baked goods, in breakfast cereal. Any number of dishes contain dairy as a critical part of the meal – melted on pizza, snacked on with wine and crackers, stirred into a soup. Added to chocolates and pastries.
There are so many plant-based alternatives though, we really do not need to use cow milk for any of those purposes.
Then the nutritional aspect.
Let’s take the calcium for one thing. Sure, calcium is not so easy to obtain from plant sources because of oxalic acid in the plants that reduces its bioavailability.
However, milk is by far not the only decent source of calcium out there.
Similarly to the protein issue, there seems to have been a common misunderstanding about how exactly we can obtain this nutrient. There are tons of plant-based calcium sources out there. Check out this for example:
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/best-vegan-calcium-sources
There is calcium in basically everything, and as with anything else, it is by eating a balanced, wholesome diet that we can reap the most benefits – and not by fixating on one ingredient.
Raw Rebellion 