\Whether or not you believe calcium is good for you (for bones or otherwise), should be it's own discussion. Lumping milk in there just because it contains calcium is sloppy. The title of this article could be changed by replacing milk with broccoli since, that too contains calcium.

So aside from the calcium, good or bad debate, drinking milk should be a separate discussion.

For example people say to avoid milk, not because it contains calcium, but because it causes your blood to be more acidic. Another reason people cite is that milk sugar, lactose. is not digested properly by some. There might be other reasons, but these 2 seems to come up the most.

On the other hand, milk contains several nutrients (other than the calcium question), that are KNOWN to be good for you, and hard to find otherwise.. trans-palmitoleic acid (TPA), conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), etc.

So in the end, it's important to do some critical thinking, and not be misled by sensational headlines.

The problem with meta-analyses is that they are the homogenization of data from possibly erroneous studies.

In cases such as this population studies may be more valuable . It is a fact that cow's cannot graze in 80% of the inhabitable areas of the earth. People in those areas have little access to cow's milk and have markedly lower rates of fracture and osteoporosis.

So, you tell me that you are assuming that cavemen even, didn't figure out how to milk any animal and get milk. You are more stupid than the caveman.

As calcium is needed for other functions in the body aside from bone development, the conundrum; does one get sufficient calcium from a 'good' non-processed diet, be it with dairy or broccoli, or does one need to supplement? I firmly believe that it is important to supplement with a variety of bone building factors, i.e., vit D3, vit K2, magnesium, selenium and sometimes strontium, but should I hold off the calcium?

Hm. Anonymoose what sensational headline? Seems like this headline is a mild and straightforward statement.

Also how is this "lumping milk in there"? Milk is shoved down our throats at every pass as the be all and end all for calcium. The broccoli you mention is not. So subbing it here wouldn't make sense at all.

I agree to drink milk or not is a totally seperate discussion and it appears Doctor Briffa might agree with this also since he didn't even go there in this article.

I'm just puzzled by your comments.

Anonymous 3. No "cavemen"...Paleolithic humans...did not milk animals. They were generally not domesticating animals (perhaps some companion dogs depending on the time frame). It likely wasn't until the Mesolithic Period, maybe 9000 BC, that some domestication of a milking animal like goats took place.

Interesting, I wonder if any of the studies looked at the Maasai tribe in Africa. They consume a liter of milk a day. Eat meat, and some plant soups. They seem to have done well for the past 600 years or so. In recent times they have started to add GRAINS to their diets to supplement some of the deficiencies in a totally Milk, meat, based diet. They also herd goats and sheep, but the cow's milk does not seem to hurt them any. Maybe it is the processes that OUR MILK goes through that are the TROUBLE!!!!!!! Maybe that weakens the milk, by changing it. Making it lifeless. To give it more SHELF LIFE. Something the Maasai, and earlier peoples did not have to contend with!!!!! They also make butter, and use buttermilk.
Natural IS BETTER! We do not have NATURAL FOOD ANY LONGER, unless you get organic everything, and NON TAMPERED WITH IN ANY WAY!!!! And that can be expensive. Or grow your own.
Be well and happy.
Steve

Raw milk has natural enzymes that help digestion, in processed milk that has been distroied. So can enzyme therapy help digestion I don't know.
I take supplaments and they seem to be helping me and I belive when a person gets a certain age they should be aware of that. Pleas if you serve milk to your family do not water it down family needs calcium any way they can get it. Lack of calcium, magneseum, and yes the other factors most of which is in milk, cheese, yogart cottage chees ect. This your body needs from a very young age. not to have it is a tragedy waiting to happen.

To not differentiate pasturized/homogenized from non-pasturized/non-homogenized is an oversite in this discussion. Pasturized/homogenized mike actually depletes calcium from the body.

I can not believe that at this time and age we still believe about cavemen as how they are depicted as being monkey like and in the process of evolution to become homo-erectus, cave dwelling is one thing, it was utilized for protection and socializing, in parts of the world, they were called hunters and gatherers, the earth may be millions of years old, but humans as we are now from the beginning had a diet of animal protein and wild fruits, and none contaminated water well at least in its natural environment, milk has its own lactose there fore even people with an intolerance will benefit from this, people we are talking about real milk, not the pasteurized junk we get as safe and beneficial, anything fortified, is junk, period. JAM

It's all about how the animals are fed. Products from grass fed animals contain more vital nutrients than animals who are grain fed, including vitamins, minerals, and fatty acids. Conventional milk products are fortified, and any fortified food lacks the synergy of nutrients that the body needs and uses. This is why we need to be VERY careful if we're supplementing with calcium. Eat real food, cook tons of leafy greens with small amounts of fat, eat fermented and cultured foods, and exercise, and we don't need to worry about fractures.

When i was growing up we were poor folks and we ate what ever we could get .We raised a big garden every year canned what we didn't eat at the time for later use.For meat we ate what ever didn'tget away from us.We had a dog that kept us with ground hogs and opussoms in the summer and squirrels and rabbits in the winter and i still think squirrels and rabbits are pretty darn good if cooked right. In the early spring we always was out looking for daniellions for greens and by the way the roots of them are a good liver tonic .dig them up ,wipe off and cut the tops off and dry .make into a powder and take a tea spoon at a time .

why, with our modern diet, do we live 3x longer than the cavemen?

From what I understand, the composition of cows milk and human milk is quite different. Humans do not grow from birth to adulthood in two years. Cows do.
Also, when milk is homogenised, the fat globules in the milk are smashed to very fine. When has anon ever seen cream set on homogenised milk? So, is anything wrong with smashing up the fat?

In it's natural large molecular form, the fat is digested in the stomach but the fat molecules are too large to go through the membranes and into the blood. When Homogenised, the much smaller smashed molecules quite easily go through the membranes and into the blood. All this thing about cholesterol in the arteries and veins comes down to being caused by homogenisation. The fat is now distributed into areas which it never went before.

My Son was allergic to cow's milk so we bought a goat. The goat's milk was extremely low in allergens and he did not have the problems any further. He can use cows milk now (He will be 41 in a couple of weeks) but is better off leaving it alone. He is healthy and is also a Nurse with 2 degrees behind his name. There is more to that than not drinking milk. He was subject to Hay Fever up till he was 34, I learned about the new science of Glyco Nutrition and encouraged him to give it a try. His allergies disappeared over a period of months and now when he travels over seas and has to have his "flu shots" he just ups his intake of the Glycos and has NO side affects from the vaccinations. His Wife does the same.

There is just one other thing we do different that makes a vast difference as well and that is we properly combine our foods. Proteins need acid digestion and starches need an Alkaline digestion system. We have stopped mixing these at the same meal and the difference is wonderful. We also keep fruit separate from vegetables etc. If anyone is interested in checking it out for themselves go to
www.greattastenopain.com/cmdt.as...
The science was discovered by a Dr hay somewhere around 1910 or thereabouts. Give it a trial and see the difference it makes and NO rewarding yourself for being "good" with eating one meal with everything mixed wrongly. You don't fool our stomach.

Enjoy life to the full. We do so why not you?

Too much calcium seems to have done something to my heart.
So maybe we should eat beefsteak everyday. I like the idea.