Cow or soy: Does an adult need to drink milk?
In cafes and bars, the demand for plant milk substitutes is growing, but some five years ago, it was almost impossible to find a vegan latte or coconut yogurt in Moscow, St. Petersburg or Kiev. The problem is familiar to me firsthand. Even as a child, after eating a lot of cheese or drinking milk, I could get a little indigestion or a couple of pimples: it turned out that the body does not tolerate lactose very well. This reaction came from the father, who strongly avoids dairy products: the percentage of lactose intolerance by African Americans is, according to various sources, from 75% to 79%, while among American Indians and Asians it reaches 90-100%. In this sense, the Eastern Slavs are lucky: only 16-18% do not digest lactose.
In any case, the conclusion about the enzymopathy, or intolerance to the substance, is better to get from the doctor: intuition may fail, moreover, there is a lot of noise recently around cow's milk. Scientists suddenly spoke of his connection with the risk of diabetes, obesity, cancer and other unpleasant conditions, and many parents questioned the need for cow's milk in the diet of children, choosing healthy plant alternatives - from almond to soy. It's time to figure out whether cow's milk has an advantage over vegetable milk and whether it is possible to exclude it from the diet without harm to health.
Is it true that cow's milk is more nutritious than vegetable milk?
The majority of mammals, which we are with you too, feed on mother's milk after birth: it contains all the necessary vitamins and trace elements. However, as soon as a baby gets on its feet (sometimes literally), breast milk is replaced by an “adult” diet. But is cow milk necessary for a child and an adult? We know from childhood that milk is an important source of calcium, vitamin D and protein. One glass of milk (200-250 g) contains as much protein as 30-40 g turkey (about as much meat is needed for a turkey sandwich, which nutritionists recommend as a quick and healthy snack).
With the same glass of milk, adult men and women get about 28-29% of the daily calcium intake and more than 30% of the recommended vitamin D standard. Given the current well-founded passion for sunscreen that minimizes the synthesis of vitamin D in the skin, we should get it can be more of this vitamin from food. The Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation and the US Department of Agriculture recommend consuming 2-3 cups of low-fat dairy products (milk is also included). According to the English system of measures used in the United States, in one glass - 8 fluid ounces, or about 227 g, and in the metric system adopted in most countries of the world, a glass is equal to 250 g.
Milk plant alternatives also contain beneficial substances, albeit in other proportions. There is enough vitamin D in cashew and almond milk, and calcium may be higher than in cow's milk, although there is less protein in these drinks. As for soy, coconut, rice or oat milk, it all depends on the manufacturer. Soy milk usually contains as much protein as cow milk, and some manufacturers add calcium and vitamin D to the drink. Rice and coconut milk contain less protein than soy milk, but these products are often also enriched with calcium and vitamin D. However, to synthetic ones vitamins can be treated differently: there is evidence that they are inferior to organic. In general, cow's milk surpasses vegetable alternatives in natural nutrient content (goat milk in this part has other indicators).
On the reverse side of the benefits
With all the benefits of milk, its role in protecting bones from fragility is somewhat exaggerated. In 2014, scientists from Harvard and Zurich Universities published the results of a study in which they over a period of 22 years observed 96,000 men and women from the teenage years of the subjects. After other factors were taken into account, biologists found that the amount of milk that people consumed as teenagers had no effect on the risk of hip fractures in adulthood. Other studies suggest that exercise and body mass index have a significantly greater effect on bone health than diet composition, provided that it is balanced.
It would seem that if the benefits of milk are exaggerated and it is possible to do without it, then nothing prevents you from switching completely to vegetable substitutes. But they also have their drawbacks. One of the major drawbacks is added sugar. This is not about popular vanilla or chocolate milk (a glass of such a drink - based on both cow's and vegetable milk - may contain more than 20 grams of sugar, and this is almost the entire daily rate for women). Even in a glass of milk or yogurt made from soy or hazelnuts with an “original” mark there may be 7-10 grams of sugar, the lion’s share of which was not naturally contained in beans or nuts, but was added by the manufacturer for flavor. There is also sugar in cow's milk - about 13 g in one glass, but lactose is a naturally occurring disaccharide. According to the American Heart Association, natural sugar should be part of a healthy diet, but industrially produced can lead to health problems if consumed in large quantities. Therefore, if you regularly drink vegetable milk, at least sometimes you should choose the options without the addition of sugar (for example, in oatmeal natural sweetish flavor).
As for soy milk, it has its own peculiarity: it contains enzyme inhibitors responsible for the breakdown of proteins. If soy products predominate in the diet for a long time, the blockade of pancreatic enzymes can cause the body to work "for wear", producing an additional amount of enzymes, and the function of the pancreas will be impaired. Many prefer soy milk and other vegetable options because of their lower content of saturated fat in comparison with cow's milk. This is not entirely justified: modern studies suggest that fats are not at all such a sworn enemy as previously thought, and you can always choose low-fat dairy products.
Of course, cow's milk is also not superfood. First, milk itself contains almost no iron, and calcium in it prevents the absorption of this trace element (although this also applies to vegan alternatives enriched with synthetic calcium). In this regard, many pediatricians believe that cow's milk is not at all indispensable for children: when a child consumes too much cow's milk, it quickly becomes saturated and subsequently eats less food rich in iron (for example, vegetable and fruit purees, croup, in older age - and meat). According to the American pediatrician Natasha Burgert, this explains one sad pattern: out of all age groups, children from 1 to 3 years old receive the least iron per day. Of course, the iron content is rather not a minus, but a feature of the product (in the same way, the low protein content in soy milk is not a disadvantage).
Is there any connection between milk and cancer and other diseases?
A number of scientific observations have shown that people who drink a lot of milk have an increased risk of developing cancer. These studies are difficult to interpret when it is not known what factors other than love for milk were taken into account. Cow milk does contain IGF-1 growth hormone, which is associated with an increased risk of cancer, but most scientists believe that the effect of milk on IGF-1 levels in the human body is negligible and is not a cause for serious concern. However, some physicians from precaution recommend limiting the daily rate to two glasses.
Another growth hormone that milk lovers often fear is recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH), which is injected into cows in the form of injections to increase milk yield. On the one hand, according to some data, there is no difference between the milk of ordinary cows and the need for animals "at injections", besides, the cow's body produces rBGH in a natural way. On the other hand, it is known that cows who are injected with growth hormone often experience mastitis, an inflammation of the mammary gland, and it has to be eliminated with the help of powerful antibiotics. With regard to the risk of diabetes, the vast majority of cases in the statistics occur in children under 1 year of age who consume cow's milk in large quantities. This is not recommended by the American Association of Pediatricians and the majority of domestic pediatricians.
Against the background of such data, one advantage of soy milk is especially pleasing. A study of American scientists, published in 2010, showed that women who used soy milk in adolescence and adulthood had a lower risk of cancer than others, and 1-2 glasses of products containing soy can protect children and adolescents per day. from cancer in the future. Such conclusions were made in connection with the content of genistein: this substance contained in soy increases the level of the anti-oncogenes BRCA1 and PTEN - the genes whose products prevent the formation of tumors, as well as the protein caveolin-1, which many scientists believe is also a growth suppressor tumors.
Balanced nutrition - with or without milk
The indispensability of cow's milk is exaggerated, but the information about its health hazards, too, seems to be bloated. The same goes for plant alternatives. All problems arise only from an excessive amount of food in the diet, but few of us drink two liters of milk a day - it doesn’t matter cow’s, goat’s or rice’s. True, in comparison with herbal options, cow's milk often contains less artificial additives and is often more nutritious than vegan options, even if pasteurized. By the way, pasteurization does not harm the health: heating using the Pasteur method is designed to decontaminate the product and extend the shelf life, while retaining most of the beneficial properties.
Composing a diet, determine what place in it you are ready to take milk. Depending on what is more important for you in this drink - less fat or synthetic vitamins, more protein or iron - the cow or goat as well as soy or almond may be the ideal choice. However, the main criterion, of course, will be taste. There is no need to worry if you do not like dairy products or refuse them for health reasons or for ethical reasons: provided there is a balanced diet in which there are most nutrients, neither adults nor children lose anything without cow's milk.
Photo: pauchi - stock.adobe.com, ksena32 - stock.adobe.com, Gresei - stock.adobe.com
