Observation Study: Milk Intake Correlated To Inflammatory Markers

jaa

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http://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g6015

The results are a bit concerning even though the authors state:

"The results should, however, be interpreted cautiously given the observational design of our study. The findings merit independent replication before they can be used for dietary recommendations."

The inflammatory markers increasing with milk consumption are what concern me the most. I'm not going to stop drinking milk, but will limit consumption to only with coffee. Some positives to come out of this study are that fermented milk products such as cheese and yoghurt are negatively associated with inflammatory markers as well as mortality and bone fractures.

What do you guys make of this study?
 

BingDing

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That it's bunk.

You'd have to read the cited studies to decide if galactose in mice and flies has any relevance to you. Measuring a generic marker of oxidative stress in a bunch of old people and concluding it is caused by galactose is ludicrous.
 
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jaa

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Whether or not galactose is the cause of the increase in inflammatory markers seems at most a minor consideration. It's just a proposed mechanism put forth by the authors that is validated in animal models. The observational study still shows that increased milk consumption in humans leads to increased inflammatory markers. Maybe increased milk consumption only results in increased inflammatory biomarkers in older men and women, but that seems like a bit of wishful thinking, assuming the study is valid.
 
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I'd like to know the people who drink mainly fermented dairy, see how they are like on average. It is interesting that galactose has the highest ketolytic and nitrogen-sparing action at least in dogs with a working pancreas. [http://jn.nutrition.org/content/12/5/469.full.pdf] The order of
efficiency of the 3 sugars to promote glycogenesis in the presence of 4 mM glucose was galactose > glucose > fructose
[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3049181] The galactose lobby quotes benefits in many diseases: http://www.galactose.org/research.html .
 

tara

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Just scanned, didn't read thoroughly. They seem to have taken into account a lot of potentially relevant covariants, but I see no mention of vitamin K, which is significant in bone metabolism, right? And would be more plentiful in fermented dairy than in fresh milk, right? Could possibly account for some of the apparent benefit of fermented over fresh milk? In addition to other weaknesses as discussed in their paper. I like their straight forward reporting of possible weaknesses.
 
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jaa said:
http://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g6015

The results are a bit concerning even though the authors state:

"The results should, however, be interpreted cautiously given the observational design of our study. The findings merit independent replication before they can be used for dietary recommendations."


The inflammatory markers increasing with milk consumption are what concern me the most. I'm not going to stop drinking milk, but will limit consumption to only with coffee. Some positives to come out of this study are that fermented milk products such as cheese and yoghurt are negatively associated with inflammatory markers as well as mortality and bone fractures.

What do you guys make of this study?
Thanks for posting this. I enjoyed reading it.

The difficulty with these trials, from a Peatian perspective, is that they do not control for the metabolic rate of the subjects (though they could), and the population at large is generally hypothyroid. In a hypothyroid subject, there are a great many factors that may increase inflammatory markers, depending on the dose and hypothyroidism of the subject, but especially the unsaturated fatty acids in the serum, or the degree of darkness.

For example, this study was done in Sweden where, at least anecdotally, there may be a high rate of consumption of unsaturated fat in fatty fish. To the extent that the subjects consumed high unsaturated to saturated fatty acid ratios, the test for inflammatory markers would be biased. Take away the unsaturated fat and you may have different results.

This is just one example, and there are many more. I'm just not familiar with the subjects and their lifestyles. But one more example is that Sweden has less daylight and if the subjects live in reduced daylight the test would again be biased.

Peat is not saying, drink milk and it will overcome the harm of eating unsaturated fat and living in darkness! Milk is one of the best foods on earth, but you need to look at milk in the context of metabolism. This study does not do that, and so is not material to Peat's views.

Specifically, Peat's view of fermented milk is that the lactic acid from fermentation is a primary metabolic poison, because it disturbs the redox balance in humans, and prevents uncoupling that gives humans their great longevity.

Does galactose actually improve consumption of oxygen in humans who are uncoupling? There's this:
In the presence of the mitochondrial uncoupler carbonylcyanide p-trifluormethoxy-phenylhydrazone (FCCP) the reserve capacity for glucose oxidation was increased in cells grown with galactose.
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Ad ... ne.0059972

Takeaway: Please do not do anything, such as reduce your consumption of milk, based on any study that you happen read. The study is likely to be very poorly designed, and conducted by university brainwashed academics who have an extremely limited view of science, and still believe in the foolish idea of chemiosmotics.
 

tara

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@VoS
I think slam an article just because the writers have been to university, and therefore it is going to be bad and should be disregarded risks an anti-science, anti-intellectual effect. I'm sure all or most of the studies Peat cites are written by university graduates, some of them fairly recent. I don't think it's useful to just assume that the conclusions of all studies are sound, either. I am sure there are biases, but they should be addressed where they show, not just blindly assumed. I imagine it is probably more rigorous to read a number of studies in an area, and to read them critically. The more we understand an area, the more critical we can be. Personally, both time and lack of biochemistry training make that hard.

I do think it is reasonable to look for possible confounders etc that are not being taken into account, eg light and fish oil.

The study did control for vit-D, but not for the other influences of light. Sweden has little daylight in winter, and some people get SAD. But it has very long daylight in summer. I would imagine that Uppsala would get better than average sunlight/year. They also have a relatively high life expectancy, which I would have thought would point to relatively good metabolism, statistically. But at any rate, are you suggesting that people who cannot get adequate sunlight might get worse effects from fresh milk, and might be better to avoid it?

With regard to oily fish, are you suggesting that people with high PUFA could be better served by cheese and yogurt, and get worse effects from fresh milk? I, like many here, have a high PUFA history, which I am now trying to reverse. I have not read of Peat suggesting only people who have been avoiding PUFA for 3 years should drink milk. He seems to think milk will be helpful to most people (unless they cannot overcome lactose or other intolerance). They did control for a number of nutrients, but I didn't specifically see reference to PUFAs - that would have been interesting.

I guess tryptophan could be relevant factor. No control for gelatine or glycine, I think.
 

Jennifer

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"Food frequency questionnaires
The participants reported their average frequency of consumption of up to 96 foods and beverages during the past year,25 27 28—that is, how many servings, a day or a week, they consumed of common foods, including milk, fermented milk, yogurt, and cheese. Instructions were given that one serving of milk corresponded to one glass of 200 mL. In the first questionnaire in the Swedish Mammography Cohort the categories were prespecified, but in the second questionnaire and the one used in the Cohort of Swedish Men, participants could fill in the exact number of servings of the dairy products (milk, fermented milk, yogurt, and cheese) they consumed a day or a week. Milk intake was specified according to fat content, and we summed intake into a single measure representing total milk intake on a continuous scale. We estimated nutrient intakes by multiplying the consumption frequency of each food item by the nutrient content of age specific portion sizes and reference data obtained from the Swedish National Food Agency database.29 The residual method was used to adjust all nutrient intakes for total energy intake.30 According to validation studies of milk intake, the correlation between the food frequency questionnaire and four, seven day food records every third month, a gold standard reference, has been approximately 0.7.31 Furthermore, in both sexes we have found a positive association between reported intake of milk and the fat tissue content of pentadecanoic acid, a biological marker reflecting average long term intake of milk fat—that is, present in both milk and fermented milk products.32 33"

I'm hoping someone can clear one thing up for me so I can later address this study.

The sentence in bold, does it mean that the participants kept record of a weeks worth of food every 3rd month for a total of 4 recorded weeks of their daily food intake within the timespan of this study?
 

pboy

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I think so, ever 3 months, 4 times, for one week they recorded their intake. So I guess it was a year long study with 4 weeks spread out of recorded data
 

Jennifer

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Okay, thank you very much, pboy! :)
 

Jennifer

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milk study said:
Participants Two large Swedish cohorts, one with 61 433 women (39-74 years at baseline 1987-90) and one with 45 339 men (45-79 years at baseline 1997), were administered food frequency questionnaires. The women responded to a second food frequency questionnaire in 1997."
Oh, goody! A food frequency questionnaire. Well, this makes for a valid study. :roll:

Correct me if I'm understanding this wrong, but in the course of two decades (mean follow-up of 20.1 years) the participants were only given two food frequency questionnaires? Men one questionnaire and women a second questionnaire in 1997 and only 4 weeks total of recorded dietary intake that is suppose to represent 20.1 years worth of participant's dietary intakes?

milk study said:
Because of the high content of lactose in milk, we hypothesised that high consumption of milk may increase oxidative stress, which in turn affects the risk of mortality and fracture. Meta-analyses of cohort studies for the association between dairy and milk intake in relation to mortality11 and fractures12 13 have displayed no clear pattern of risk, and evidence from randomised trials are lacking.
Oh geez! I hope someone jumps on this and develops baby formula that lacks lactose. Then they can issue laws forcing all moms, including breast feeding moms, to switch to their special baby formula. Those babies drinking all that lactose are just asking for trouble. Maybe that's why babies spend so much time rolling around on the floor. Those osteoporatic bones from all that milk consumption can't hold their little bodies upright.

milk study said:
Biomarkers
D-galactose supplementation in animals has been shown to increase oxidative stress and inflammation.4 5 6 7 To assess the association between milk intake and biological markers of oxidative stress and inflammation (fig 1), we additionally analysed a clinical subcohort of the Swedish Mammography Cohort25 and the previously described Uppsala Longitudinal Study of Adult Men cohort.41 We assessed food intake by a third food frequency questionnaire in the Swedish Mammography Cohort Clinical (n=5022; mean age 70 years) and by recording diet for one week at age 71 years in the Uppsala Longitudinal Study of Adult Men (n=1138). In 892 women (mean age 70 years) and 633 men (urine collected at age 77) we analysed the urine oxidative stress marker 8-iso-PGF2α, a dominant F2-isoprostane and an ideal standard biomarker of oxidative stress in vivo.42We used serum from the same age group in the Uppsala Longitudinal Study of Adult Men to analyse interleukin 6 (a main inflammatory biomarker, n=700).
So should we believe that the inflammation in animal models given isolated D-galactose supplementation happens to us as well from our own dietary intake and in a woman's own natural production of breast milk?

They want us to believe that nature is so flawed as to make mother's milk inflammatory to her offspring? Would that be advantageous to the development of her baby? A baby which grows quite rapidly on breast milk. Below is an example of the process:

"In the human body, glucose is changed into galactose via hexoneogenesis to enable the mammary glands to secrete lactose. However, most lactose in breast milk is synthesized from galactose taken up from the blood, and only 35±6% is made from galactose from de novo synthesis. [4] Glycerol also contributes some to the mammary galactose production.[5]"

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactose

milk study said:
Comorbidity and other additional information
From the questionnaires we obtained information on lifestyle, weight, and height. For the Swedish Mammography Cohort the questionnaires also covered information on use of postmenopausal oestrogen therapy, menopausal status, and parity.
For the women that were on oestrogen replacement therapy, did the ones carrying out the study consider that estrogen contributes to bone fractures and osteoporosis or are they like everyone else who mistakenly believe that estrogen prevents osteoporosis and bone fractures? This makes a huge difference in perceived causes of bone fractures.

milk study said:
We observed a dose dependent higher rate of both mortality and fracture in women and a higher rate of mortality in men with milk intake, a pattern not discerned with other dairy products. Milk intake was not associated with fracture rate in men. There were positive associations between milk intake and concentrations of markers for oxidative stress and inflammation.
Why would women suffer fractures in this study, but not men? Obviously there is more to this then "milk causes bone fractures." Hmm...hormonal differences? Estrogen replacement therapy, synthetic progestins and/or birth control pills/IUD rings?

milk study said:
Comparison with other studies
A high intake of milk is accompanied by a higher energy intake, as indicated by the baseline characteristics of our participants. However, results from both cohort studies52 53 and randomised controlled trials54 55 show that a high intake of dairy products is not associated with an increase in weight or body mass index despite a higher intake of energy. These results are in line with the present study where those who reported a high milk intake also had higher energy intake but a similar body mass index compared with women and men with a lower milk intake.
I'm quoting this because I thought it was interesting that it's in line with Ray's view that dairy reduces weight.

Conclusion...ask me in a questionnaire what I ate over the course of a year and let that apply to 20.1 years of my life because we all know that no one diets, our food preferences never change, the quality of the foods at the time of the survey stayed consistent for those 20.1 years, all lifestyle factors, jobs, stress/mental state, living situation ect. ect. ect. are the same.

This is just my belief, but unless we are put into a controlled setting for the duration of a study and that study is carried out for an extended period of time, say like the Minnesota Starvation Experiment, where the participants every move is accounted for, I don't think we can put much faith or our health for that matter into these questionnaire studies. Heck, I think even a change in a person's thoughts/beliefs will effect outcomes that a study could never control for.

Studies scare people into avoiding fructose even in something as natural as fruit. Studies scare us into avoiding the sun and studies scare us into avoiding milk. Where are all the studies scaring us off of prescription drugs, x-rays, crooked doctors, weight-loss pills, chemically laden frankenfoods, stressful jobs, destructive people ect.? No, instead they'll study a substance that is the first food we receive at birth and in which sustains our lives when we are in our most vulnerable states and conclude that it's responsible for mortality. I give the benefit of the doubt that they have the best of intentions in doing these studies, but milk deadly? Seriously!?

Instead of studying a substance as vital as water, I think time would be better spent in enforcing better living conditions and treatment for these beautiful milk giving creatures. They give us a gift. Their milk is a gift I'm certainly grateful for.
 

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tara

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@Jennifer: Lots of good thoughts.

I think it might be possible for milk composition to be better suited to growing young than mature or aging adults - there are some differences in needs. I think Peat has suggested this wrt the amino acid balance in milk, which gelatine would help balance. I'm not suggesting it's bad food for most adults, just that it is more tailored for youngsters.

Other possible factors might be load-bearing exercise promoting stronger bones, and some kinds of activities making people more prone to accidents and fractures.
 

Kasper

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Correct me if in wrong, but isnt all milk in Sweden fortified with vitamin A. I heard Danny Roddy saying that he has problems with milk that is fortified with vitamin A, maybe this depletes vitamin D? Or maybe this is some kind of synthetic vitamin that is not good for the body?
 

lindsay

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I am pretty sure this was the inspiration for Bukowski's thread on Peatarian:
http://peatarian.com/50013/journal-chee ... -fractures

My simple reasoning from the study is K2 (and likely other fat soluble vitamins, such as D3 - which would be especially pertinent in a Swedish study). In fermented dairy products, it should stand to reason that K2 content is higher - especially in hard cheeses, like gouda. K2 helps to deposit calcium properly in the bones and helps stop calcification of arteries and other tissues. In yogurt, it's possible that there is enough bacteria present to help K2 conversion in the gut. I think loads of calcium improperly balanced with K2, Vitamin D3, and under the influence of estrogen can be dangerous (under the influence of estrogen, calcium is deposited in the soft tissue of the bone). RP mentioned this in an interview - about other factors that should be taken into account in milk studies. This is why I think people really need to gauge the whole of RP's philosophy - it's not just drink milk & OJ. The other vitamins & minerals are very important for balance.

On a side note, it would be interesting to see how raw milk would do in such a study, since it might have the necessary bacteria for K2 conversion.
 

pboy

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the thing is, the amount of vitamin K in milk, and equivalent fat of yogurt or cheese is the same. Milk already has k1 and k2 in it...the content doesn't increase by the fermentation process. They may change a hint more of the k1 to k2, or the k2 into a different form...but the body can easily do this anyways. Also, id assume the vit K content is already balanced to the calcium in milk...considering the young cow grows perfectly on that ratio.

The study didn't account for the fact people were almost certainly drinking low fat or skim milk, which has the K removed...so the ratio to calcium would be off. Not to mention, theres lots of info showing that drinking milk that has been skimmed doesn't digest properly, or get used as does whole milk...so it might be causing a stress reaction or something. Or the fact the milk theyre drinking might have added vit A or D, the D might increase calcium absorption and if the milk isn't whole, the K ratio will then be off

im fairly certain, plain whole milk would not have that association
 

lindsay

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yeah but I think the bacteria is the main thing that helps with the conversion of K2 in the gut. most people drink pasteurized milk. the young cow drinks raw milk - as I said, I think raw milk is a completely different substance. Taste wise, my preference is for raw milk. pasteurized milk tastes different. I had posted a comparison between cows fed raw milk vs. pasteurized to Peatarian awhile ago, but I can't find it now. It had pictures of their stomachs - the raw milk fed cow was definitely healthier.
 

Jennifer

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tara said:
I think it might be possible for milk composition to be better suited to growing young than mature or aging adults - there are some differences in needs. I think Peat has suggested this wrt the amino acid balance in milk, which gelatine would help balance. I'm not suggesting it's bad food for most adults, just that it is more tailored for youngsters.

Right! I think it's more of an issue in terms of milk not being appropriate as the only source of food for an adult.

This is what Ray had to say in his milk article:

"Since milk's primary biological function is to support the growth of a young animal, some of its features make it inappropriate as a sole food for an adult. To support cell division and growth, the methionine and tryptophan content of milk is higher than would be optimal for an adult animal, and the phosphate might be slightly more than needed, in relation to the calcium. Since the fetus stores a large amount of iron during gestation, the iron content of milk is low, and when a young animal has used the stored iron, its continuing growth requires more iron than milk provides. However, for an adult, the low iron content of milk and cheese makes these foods useful for preventing the iron overload that often contributes to the degenerative diseases.

Combining milk and cheese with fruits adds to the antistress effect. The additional sugar and potassium and other minerals allow the milk protein to be used more efficiently, by moderating the secretion of cortisol, and helping to inhibit the secretion of PTH."

http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/milk.shtml
 

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