Low-Fat Milk Makes You Fat – Full Fat Raw Milk Doesn’t

Dr. Mercola's Comments

Misleading, or at times downright fraudulent, advertising for processed food
products is so widespread, if you believed it all you'd think you could live a
long healthy life sustained by little more than Twinkies and McDonalds.

If you're not already convinced of that fallacy, watch SuperSize
Me - a great documentary that shows how eating nothing but fast food
for just thirty days will leave you scratching a feeble finger at
death's door.

But let's get back to the issue of milk, of which there's also what you
could call the "junk variety," and the Real McCoy.

I'm not at all surprised to find that science does not support claims that
low-fat dairy can't help you lose weight, for the simple fact that healthy
weight comes from healthy eating habits. Unfortunately, so many people believe
processed low-fat pasteurized dairy is a part of a healthy diet!

Nothing could be further from the truth. While low fat may be appropriate
and help weight loss if you are a carb nutritional type, it is my strong belief
that you should avoid all pasteurized dairy, and ideally only consume raw
grass-fed organic dairy.

"Low-Fat" Milk Makes You Fat - Full Fat Raw Milk
Doesn't

It's common knowledge among farmers that pigs fed skimmed milk gain weight
easily, whereas pigs fed whole milk stay lean. A 2005 study
published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, found
that this seeming paradox holds true for humans as well. After following almost
13,000 children (ages 9-14 years) for three years, they found that weight gain
was associated with drinking reduced-fat and skim milk. However, they also
concluded that it wasn't dairy fat itself that caused the weight gain, but
rather the excess calories.

Okay. So wouldn't drinking whole raw milk have the same effect?

Not necessarily. Because the butterfat in whole raw milk, particularly
butterfat in milk from cows that graze freely on green pasture, contains unique
nutrients that support thyroid function and help your body develop muscle
rather than fat.

Why Won't Pasteurized Milk Build a Healthy Body
Like Raw Milk Does?

Whereas raw milk from grass-fed cows is full of things that your body will
thrive on: good bacteria, enzymes, raw fat, and cancer-fighting
conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), among other things, pasteurized
milk is known to cause all kinds of health troubles, from digestive upset
to perhaps even autism
and diabetes. 

These ailments, and the even more common problem of lactose intolerance, is
not due to milk being an inappropriate food for humans - after all, primitive
societies have thrived on milk diets for quite some time -- but rather, the
processing of it has turned the milk into something your body can't optimally
use.

It is not uncommon for people who switch to RAW milk to report that many of
their health issues -- from allergies, to digestive troubles, to skin issues
like eczema -- clear up.

However, milk allergies are a real issue for many, so if you have a severe
milk or dairy allergy you will most likely want to limit or avoid even raw milk.

Before There Was Pasteurization, Milk was Medicine! 

You don't hear about this anymore, but in the early 1900's milk was actually
used as medicine. Dr. J.R. Crewe's "Milk Cure" was used at the Mayo clinic to
successfully treat: 

• cancer
• weight loss
• kidney disease
• allergies
• skin problems
• urinary tract and prostate
  problems
• chronic fatigue, and a
  whole host of other chronic conditions

Naturally, the only milk available at the time was raw whole milk, rich in
butterfat, from pasture fed cows.

Dr. Crewe, MD -- one of the founders of the Mayo Foundation -- published an article in Certified
Milk Magazine (January 1929), describing the milk treatment as a
combination of "detoxifying fast and nutrient dense feeding," and how diseases
that have no similarity improved rapidly on raw milk.  

Dr. Crewe used the milk cure for 15 years, and his patients were wild
about it because it worked, and required no additional drugs or other medical
interventions. Unfortunately his fellow medical practitioners were not as
enthusiastic. Many physicians agreed on the fitness of dairy products as food,
but were not interested in using it as a sole means of treatment.

Said Crewe in his article, "The chief
fault of the treatment is that it is too simple... and it does not appeal to the
modern medical man."

This despite the fact that striking results were seen in tuberculosis,
diseases of the nervous system, cardiovascular and renal conditions. Anemia and
pernicious anemia responded well to it, as well as toxic thyroid and chronic
cough.

"Hypertension responds with equal gratification. The blood pressure
improves rapidly," wrote Crew. "I have never seen such rapid and lasting
results by any other method."

What Causes Weight Gain and Disease?

Dr. Crewe, as a result of his experiences with food as medicine, became
convinced that much of modern disease is due to an increasing departure from
the simple preparation of plain nutrient-rich foods.

I wholeheartedly agree.

He continues, "The treatment of various diseases over a period of 18
years with a practically exclusive milk diet has convinced me personally that
the most important single factor in the cause of disease, and in the resistance
to disease, is food. I have seen so many instances of the rapid and marked
response to this form of treatment that nothing could make me believe this is
not so." 

Folks, when you look at the diets of indigenous cultures displaying robust
health across the globe, regardless of whether their diet consists of mostly
fruits, vegetables and dairy, or meats and fish, the common denominator is
always that their diet is mainly eaten raw.  

Stray too far from a raw, naturally-grown diet and you're bound to encounter
health complications. And pasteurized milk is definitely FAR from its original,
nutrient-dense state.  

What About Safety? Isn't Pasteurized Milk "Cleaner"? 

While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warns that raw milk can carry
disease-causing bacteria, what they completely overlook is the fact that these
bacteria are the result of industrial farming practices that lead to diseased
animals, which may then in turn produce contaminated milk. You never want to
get your raw milk from a feed-lot cow. 

Drinking raw milk produced by grass-fed cows from clean, well-run farms,
however, is far LESS dangerous than drinking pasteurized milk. 

In fact, not only does raw milk contain good bacteria that are essential for
a healthy digestive system, raw milk also offers protection against
disease-causing bacteria!

Mark McAfee, owner of Organic Pastures, the largest raw dairy in the United States,
has inoculated pathogenic contaminants such as E. coli, Listeria and Salmonella
into his raw milk, and into pasteurized milk. In the raw milk, none of the
pathogens survived because the natural bacteria were able to protect the milk.
In the pasteurized milk, however -- in which the bacteria and enzymes have been
destroyed -- the pathogens were able to take over.  

To think that pasteurized milk is safer (even if you don't believe it's
healthier) than raw milk from a healthy, grass-fed cow is simply not true.
There's been more than one outbreak of deadly contamination of pasteurized
milk, as this CDC chart summarizing Pasteurized
Milk Outbreaks by State and pathogen - 1966 - 2000 will attest to. 

Looking for Raw Milk?

As demand for raw milk continues to grow, it will, hopefully, become
easier and easier to come by. In Massachusetts,
for example, the number of dairies licensed to sell raw milk has grown from 12
to 23 just in the past two years. 

If you're still unsure of where to go, you can locate a raw milk source near
you at the Campaign for Real Milk Web site.
You can also look here to find out the legal status of raw milk in the
U.S. state or country where you live.