Sacred cow of diet has its side-effects

By ROGER DOBSON

Milk is always seen as a healthy drink. But dairy allergies are increasing - and they can be life-threatening.

In a new report on intolerance, an English physician and allergist Dr Harry Morrow-Brown says that over the past two decades, the incidence of food allergies has been increasing at an alarming rate.

"We now consume milk from the cradle to the grave in much greater quantities than our grandparents ever did. This is a major change in diet, which many of us may not be able to tolerate, so that subtle and infinitely variable presentations of milk intolerance can appear at any age," he says.

He has put together a dossier on a wide variety of individual cases in which reactions to milk have been implicated in conditions including asthma, eczema, arthritis and irritable bowel syndrome.

For some people, such as 6-year-old Layla Hanif, all the good things in a youngster's life - icecream, chocolate, sweets, cakes - could be lethal. The threat is so serious that the youngster has her own minder at school, eats on her own, and carries an adrenalin kit should she have a severe, life-threatening reaction.

"She can't touch other children, she can't go to other people's houses. Even someone walking down the street with an icecream is a potential hazard," says Julia, her mother.

Layla is just one of an increasing number of people who are either allergic to cow's milk, or who have an intolerance to dairy products. New research suggests that for some, milk can be responsible for chronic disease and general ill-health. It can even affect a child's handwriting and lead to allegations of child maltreatment.

Researchers are questioning the wisdom of drinking so much milk.

"Milk marketing organisations have promoted the value of milk for health and fitness to such an extent that the medical and nursing professions, as well as the general public, have become convinced that milk is good for you,"says Dr Morrow-Brown, who works in Derby.

"The idea that milk can also be very bad for you has become almost heresy, and the fact that cow's milk was intended for baby cows, not for baby humans, seems to have been forgotten."

There is no doubt that milk contains important nutrients, including protein and riboflavin. Probably its most important constituent is easily absorbed calcium to boost bones and teeth.

Before 1950, an allergy to cow's milk was considered to be very rare. But now, according to a team of French researchers, it is believed to affect 10 per cent of infants and 5 per cent of older children. The immediate reactions caused by an allergy are in sharp contrast to intolerance, in which normal amounts of milk slowly produce chronic effects.

Although research has produced increasing evidence that dairy products can cause negative effects, this is not a new idea. As long ago as 1936, researchers reported that eczema was seven times as common in formula-milk-fed infants as in those who were breast-fed.

Dr Morrow-Brown says that milk can also have effects on the emotions: "Milk-intolerant children often have a short attention span, cannot sit still, and have tantrums, poor coordination, a tendency to self-injury and destructiveness, which occur repeatedly after consumption of milk."

He described the case of an 8-year-old girl who was bedwetting and hyperactive, and who also had tantrums. She was a miserable, unhappy child. Her school performance was poor because she could not concentrate or sit still.

After three months on a milk-free diet she was a happy, bright child with a changed personality, and her writing had improved remarkably," he says.

In his report he adds that milk intolerance can indirectly lead to allegations of child assault, citing the case of a boy who would inflict pain on himself. His behaviour improved within a week of his starting a milk-free diet.



Other teams of researchers have found links between milk and a range of other diseases and health problems, including insulin-dependent diabetes, heart disease, infertility, and colic in babies. This has fuelled claims that cow's milk is not a natural food for humans.

Michelle Berriedale-Johnson, the editor of Inside Story, a journal for people on a restrictive diet, said:

"We are the only mammal that continues to drink milk of any kind after weaning and certainly the only one that drinks the milk of another species. People in the Far East are naturally lactose intolerant, but due to the Americanisation of their diet they are learning to tolerate lactose."

A wide range of cow's milk alternatives are available, including soya, goat's, sheep's, and rice milk, as well as lactose-reduced milk. All are good alternative sources of calcium for those who cannot tolerate cow's milk or who wish to reduce their consumption of it. However, some other animal milks can also cause allergies.

Calcium is also found in sardines, watercress, figs, rhubarb, and many nuts. Fresh fruit and vegetables are a good source, too.

- INDEPENDENT

Herald feature: Health