Homogenization of Milk

The following is a quote from the Dec. 2003 Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients: Letters to the Editor p. 95: (I should add that it has been long suspected by others that homogenization is responsible for lactose intolerance, widely reported these days. From this opinion we get support below for this notion---Mike)

In 1936 the entire dairy industry began to sell homogenized milk. Oster holds that the homogenizing of milk has caused a vast increase in heart attach deaths and has caused many amputation of diabetic patient's legs. Here is Oster's explanation for the harm due to the homogenizing of milk. Nature put xanthine oxidase, an oxidizing enzyme, in milk in big particles. As such, they will not pass through the intestinal tract and they will not get into the blood. Once milk is homogenized, the xanthine oxidase particles are made very small and all of them get into the blood circulation. This according to Oster, is most harmful to the vascular tree, causing heart attacks and foot and leg ulcers in diabetic patients.

Professor Stephen Seely of the University of Sheffield found this of interest and did a study of liquid milk and cheese consumption vs. heart attacks. His report was in Medical Hypotheses 1981 vol 7 pp. 907-10. At the time of his study, milk worldwide was homogenized.

Finland had the highest death rate from heart attacks of any nation in the world. Protein from liquid milk in Finland was 30.4 grams a day. In Germany liquid milk protein was 14.1 grams a day. In Japan liquid milk protein was only 2.5 grams a day. Finland had twice the death rate from heart attacks as had Germany and the death rate from heart attacks in Finland was 10 times the death rate from heart attacks in Japan. Then Seely did a study of milk protein in cheese consumption in several nations. He could find no increase in heat attacks due to eating cheese. In the making of cheese the milk in never homogenized.

Now back to Oster. He showed me three photos of diabetic patients with leg and foot ulcers. In all three cases other doctors had advised amputation at once. he showed before and after photos with the ulcers healed and amputations prevented. He said that folic acid is an antagonist to xanthine oxidase and will tend to nullify the harm of it. His treatment was to get the patient to avoid homogenized milk and to take 80 mg. of folic acid a day and ten grams of vitamin C a day. That is about 100 times as much folic acid as in average vitamin pills..........

Townsend Letter Dec. 2003, p. 117 Rao, RK, et al. Luminal stability of Insulin-like Growth Factors I and II in developing rat gastrointestinal tract J Ped. Gastroent & Nut 1998 Feb. 26(2): 179-85 Presence of casein in milk keeps IGF-1 intact in the stomach, which facilitates the passing of this hormone into the bloodstream of those who consume milk

Townsend Letter Dec. 2003, p. 117 Oster KA et al. Liposomes as a proposed vehicle for the presorption of bovine xanthine oxidase Proc Soc Exper Bio & Med 1980 Jan; 163(1) homogenization process used in the production of milk has been shown to facilitate the absorption of IGF-1.