Does calcium in Milk cause Osteoporosis Disease? Read more
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Explanation
In the Facebook post shared by the user claims with a video where we see a lady stating “Why you shouldn’t drink milk? and she went on to explain it with a whiteboard. According to the 1-minute 23-second video, “Here’s a glass of milk and this glass of milk is high in calcium but it’s also high in animal protein. Animal protein is a dirty burning fuel, only 58% is burnt as fuel.
Do you know what that leaves? A 42% waste and that’s a high acid waste and it is a sulphur waste so what the body uses is most the alkaline mineral which is calcium to negate the sulphur residue. Do you know how much calcium is left in the human body after a person drinks a glass of milk? None. Cows can access that calcium because they’ve got 5 stomachs but we have only one and the countries in this world that are the highest dairy consumers have the highest incidence of osteoporosis. The woman in the video went on to add, where does the elephant get his calcium from for his huge bones?
Where do the orangutans the creatures on this planet with the biggest bones are vegetarians they get it from grass. I got some good news, you don’t have to eat grass, you can eat broccoli and bok choy and all your dark green leaves.” This same post was also shared by other social media users which can be seen here and here. Come, let’s check the authenticity of this claim.
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What’s the truth ?
When we started our research we first found out the composition of milk. According to the website, ‘Milk Facts’ the gross composition of cow’s milk in the U.S. is 87.7% water, 4.9% lactose (carbohydrate), 3.4% fat, 3.3% protein, and 0.7% minerals (referred to as ash). Milk composition varies depending on the species (cow, goat, sheep), breed (Holstein, Jersey), the animal’s feed, and the stage of lactation.
When we researched further, we came to know the various counts of calcium in the dairy sources. It’s told that the calcium content of the milk varies with the breed of the cow. Sometimes, ‘Milk from Jersey and Guernsey cows usually has over 130 mg calcium/100 g milk while Holsteins and Ayrshires generally have 120 mg/100 g or less.’
As per the research studies and article of Healthline.com, the high amounts of calcium in milk is the cause osteoporosis is a myth. The reason is that when protein is digested, it increases the acidity of the blood. The body then pulls calcium from the blood to neutralize the acid. However, there really isn’t much scientific support for this theory.
A research paper study showing the relationship between the calcium-to-protein ratio in milk and the urinary calcium excretion in healthy adults can be seen here.
Here, excessive protein consumption leads to greater excretion of calcium in urine without a corresponding increase in calcium absorption. This impact of dietary protein on calcium balance is due to the acid content of animal protein. However, the precise ratio between calcium intake and its utilization for compensating urinary calcium losses remains uncertain. Eventhough drinking milk improves your bone health and density in elderly people, some reports contradict these statements and tells that consuming excessive amounts of milk could lead to increased calcium excretion in the urine, potentially weakening bones over time.
According to Christopher Gardner, a researcher at Stanford, that milk is indeed a valuable source of calcium but may not be the critical factor in maintaining bone health. However, it is nowhere reported that the limited intake of milk could lead to Osteoporosis or any other bone diseases.
India, European countries and US rank the top three countries which consume the highest annual consumption of fluid cow milk worldwide according to the 2022 data from the statista.com.
Interestingly since these above countries report more cases related to osteoporosis according to the data sources which is worrisome but this alone doesn’t label milk as the main cause for the disease.
There are other factors which are also responsible for osteoporosis including genetics, physical activity, body weight, smoking (including exposure to second hand smoke), alcohol consumption, hormone levels, and medications. Therefore, if any of those risk factors are more common in these countries that have the highest dairy consumption, then the link between dairy and osteoporosis may be nothing more than a coincidence.
We also contacted Dr Praveen Kumar from YouTurn to get an insight regarding this viral clip and he said that, it’s not true. The cow milk contain calcium and animal protein like casein, but it will not affect like what it is said here in the video. He said that the lactose and calcium will be absorbed by our body. He also added that milk is a good source of calcium and it’s good for our health.
Conclusion:
Thus, we conclude through our research that it is impossible to isolate milk protein as solely responsible for causing osteoporosis. There are many other lifestyle variables that may have an influence and need to be taken into consideration.
