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The Dark Side of Dairy: Part 3

Message in a Bottle

Heather Mills reckons that our daily pint has something to tell us – and for the sake of our health we should listen to it.

We grow up accepting so many things as normal and never give them a thought until something shocks us out of our complacency. And that happened to me recently over milk and dairy products. Children need dairy almost more than any other food, we’re constantly told, as the calcium it contains is vital for bones, for teeth and for strength. So successful has been the marketing hype that you risk having your sanity questioned if you criticise the white stuff. The truth is, the claims are not true and blanket advertising has successfully masked that and some other disturbing facts.

The proof lies in the 70 per cent of people in the world who never drink cow’s milk or eat dairy because they can’t tolerate it. They lose the ability to digest the sugar in milk after weaning. They’re not all floppy with bendy bones! In fact, there is powerful evidence that those who don’t drink milk have stronger bones. Americans, on the other hand, are top of the milk-drinking league yet have some of the highest rates of osteoporosis in the world.

I’ve discovered a great deal about dairy recently thanks to a massive new scientific report, White Lies, by the health charity, Vegetarian & Vegan Foundation (VVF), of which I am a patron. The most shocking fact is that up to 400 million pus cells are permitted in every litre of milk.

It isn’t just that we’re expected to drink the stuff but no mention is ever made of how it gets there. - About a third of the entire UK herd of Dairy cows at any one time are diseased with excruciatingly painful mastitis that they produce copious amounts of pus from their udders which finds its way into their milk.

If that doesn’t make your stomach turn, every sip of milk also contains a cocktail of 11 different growth factors and 35 different hormones because of the practice of milking pregnant animals, whose oestrogen and other hormone levels are sky high. About two thirds of all milk comes from pregnant cows; the rest from animals who have recently given birth.

Like most people, I had never given a thought as to why cows produce milk. The first thing people have to get their heads round is that it doesn’t happen automatically. A cow has to be made pregnant and give birth to a calf every year. Only to see it taken away at about 48 hours old so we can have her milk. She is made pregnant again within weeks and then carries the unnatural double burden of pregnancy and giving huge amounts of milk at the same time.

My own dramatic experience should have taught me something about what a healthy body needs. When I lost part of my leg, the residual limb wouldn’t heal despite a battery of antibiotics so I was faced with having to change infected dressings every day. Stopping the drugs and switching to a raw vegan diet worked what seemed like a miracle for me, and my wound healed over almost before my eyes. Initially I couldn’t sustain this diet in the main I feel as their wasn’t a vast range of tasty vegan alternative’s of my favourite foods available and I do like to eat good food. Now however I am a conventional vegan and eat no meat, fish or dairy products.

Despite British people’s strong emotional attachment to dairy, an increasing amount of evidence shows that it is not a wonder food. The nutrients in milk, cheese, butter, cream, ice cream and milk chocolate are all available from healthier, plant-based foods that don’t contain saturated animal fat, cholesterol and animal protein, growth factors and hormones and lactose, which so many people can’t digest.

These substances have been linked to many diseases including some of the UK’s biggest killers such as heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer and prostate cancer as well as osteoporosis, eczema, asthma, Crohn’s disease, colic, constipation and even teenage acne.

The more I discover, the more I am convinced that my decision to avoid dairy entirely is the right one. Childhood obesity is exploding out of control and the simple fact that those kids who drink the most milk gain the most weight should cause alarm bells to be ringing everywhere. It horrifies me when I see how many unwitting mothers are feeding their children cows' milk formula. Cow’s milk is perfect for calves but far from perfect for human babies or adults for that matter.

But there’s another reason why I’m vegan and that is the appalling animal welfare. I am also patron of the animal campaigns group Viva! whose video footage and report, The Dark Side of Dairy is literally shocking.

Until this May, as many as 500,000 newborn little bull calves every year were simply taken behind the cow sheds and shot in the head as they can’t produce milk and are the wrong breed for beef. Since May, the export trade in live calves has begun again so now they’re transported to the obscenity of European veal crates or filthy ‘group housing’ units. Fed a liquid-only diet, they are purposely diseased so their flesh is pale and anaemic and there’s no bedding because in their desperation for solid food, they would eat it.

I will not allow this to be done in my name when I can be healthier and happier not supporting the dairy industry.

For more information read the White Lies report by the Vegetarian & Vegan Foundation at at http://www.vegetarian.org.uk/campaigns/whitelies/index.html
Dark Side of Dairy report by Viva! at http://www.milkmyths.org.uk/intro.php