I'd like to preface this post by saying that my personal choice to not consume dairy products in no way effects my judgements and personal feelings for my friends, family members, or any one else who may stumble upon this blog. It has taken me several years of hearing, reading and even seeing the same information before I could mentally make this decision.
As promised, the Dairy Facts! (Sorry for all the quote copying)
1. Dairy products contain Cow's blood & Pus along with Pesticides, Hormones, & Antibiotics which pose a real health hazard.
To be profitable farmers treat dairy cows like milk making machines forcing them to produce 10x the natural amount they would normally produce. The cow's metabolism and health suffers. They are hooked up to automated milking machines constantly and their sensitive udders frequently become infected and lead to mastitis, causing bleeding and pus to seep into the milk supply. GROSS!
Cows are not freely and happily roaming the pasture.. they are quartered in solitary concrete stalls inside barns of 200- 20,000 dairy cows. The dairy industry is BIG BUSINESS focused on Profitability.. not the welfare or comfortability of the animals (VEAL is proof of that), and definitely not on your health.
Sickness, disease, "downed cows" are common and expected. Which is why there are numerous businesses that distribute antibiotics, insecticides, and pesticides just for cows.
If you are consuming dairy make sure to use rRGH free dairy products to avoid this cancer-causing chemical, see list:
http://www.sustainabletable.org/getinvolved/statepdfs/TX.pdf
Pesticides:
"A survey of the primary dairy producing areas in the US indicated that 13 percent of lactating animals were treated with insecticides permethrin, pyrethrin, coumaphos, and dichlorvos primarily by daily or every-other-day coat sprays. [8]" ~Wikipedia
"Concentrated Animal Feed Operations are usually vegetation-less concrete facilities, holding at least 200 dairy cattle for medium scale operation, and at least 700 for large scale operation23. The largest operations hold over 20,000 dairy cattle24. Tails are "docked" (cut off), a procedure that claims to keep udders clean by preventing fecal bacteria infections on the udders, though no supporting evidence to back this claim is found25. Under this intense strain and close quarters, cows develop and spread disease with ease and in turn are given low daily doses of antibiotics, creating increasing problems with antibiotic-resistant bacteria. In these factory farms, a cow's life expectancy is 3-4 years, exhausted from intense milking and frequent disease. Under normal pasture conditions, a cow can expect to live upwards of 20 years26."
#2 Dairy products are linked to allergies, heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer, ovarian cancer, prostate cancer, autism, leukemia and other diseases.
http://www.nutritionmd.org/nutrition_tips/nutrition_tips_understand_foods/dairy.html
#3 There is more suffering in the dairy industry.
"She is constantly hooked up to a milking machine, in a solitary pen, with only enough room to stand and lie down. She can not walk or move. Milking machines are automated, and other machines feed the cows. Even the light in the factory is artificially automated, to get the most milk from the cow. They are milked several times a day, causing their teats to become swollen, sore, and sometimes infected. When a dairy cow has stopped producing milk, she goes to slaughter."
On top of that baby calfs are taken away from their mothers and deprived of the nutrition they need so that there is no "waste" of the mom cow's milk. The mother cows cry for days at this unnatural separation. The baby calfs are fated to become Veal and kept in small crates and intentionally kept malnourished, crying and starving for its entire short life.
#4 Drinking Milk actually causes osteoporosis.
"It seems that the countries with the highest intake of dairy products are invariably the countries with the most osteoporosis."
"Numerous studies have shown that the level of calcium ingestion and especially calcium supplementation has no effect whatever on the development of osteoporosis. The most important such article appeared recently in the British Journal of Medicine where the long arm of our dairy industry can't reach. Another study in the United States actually showed a worsening in calcium balance in post-menopausal women given three 8-ounce glasses of cows' milk per day."
#5 Human adults are not meant to consume Milk. Mothers of all species stop lactating after a specific period for a reason. Each species milk is naturally formulated to meet the needs of that species' offspring. Cows milk is for baby calfs, human milk is for baby humans, dog's milk is for puppies, etc. NO other species drinks the milk of another species, it is not natural.
#6 The US struggles to export cow's drinking milk due to its higher levels of SCCs and Toxins. If other countries won't drink it, why should we?
(Overall in 2008, the US exported only 10% of its total milk supply, and it was in the solid form of whey, lactose, milk powder and cheese. As you see below other countries have much higher standards for the health and safety of their drinking milk)
"An indicator of the quality of milk is the somatic cell count (SCC). Somatic cells are body cells, including leucocytes (white blood cells). The number of somatic cells increases in response to pus producing bacterium like Staphylococcus aureus, a cause of the painful disease mastitis. The SCC is quantified as cells per ml. General agreement rests on the values of less than 100,000 cells/ml for uninfected cows and greater than 300,000 for cows infected with significant pathogens. The average SCC during 2000 for the U.S. was 316 000. The U.S. has the highest upper limit for SCC (750 000 cells/ml) of the entire major developed dairy producing countries of the world. The E.U., New Zealand, Australia, Switzerland, and Norway all accept 400 000 SCC as the upper limit and New Zealand may consider adopting 300 000 cells/ml in the future."
#7 You can get Calcium from much healthier sources (PLANTS- naturally low in fat and sugar). I love this quote:
"Well, where do you get your calcium?" The answer is: "From exactly the same place the cow gets the calcium, from green things that grow in the ground," mainly from leafy vegetables. After all, elephants and rhinos develop their huge bones (after being weaned) by
eating green leafy plants, so do horses.
Alternative sources of calcium:
Broccoli, Peas, Soy yogurt, soy, almonds, sesame seeds, kale, bok choy, baked beans, white beans, okra, turnip greens, spinach, collard greens, rhubarb, tofu, & the numberous calcium-fortified cereals, breads and drinks.
#8 Dairy and the meat industry do more Environmental damage than all the cars in the world.
"A 2006 United Nations report found that the meat industry produces more greenhouse gases than all the SUVs, cars, trucks, planes, and ships in the world combined.2"
"As if the chemicals and particulate matter from animal waste weren’t bad enough, the meat and dairy industries often knowingly add to the air-quality crisis. When the cesspools holding tons of urine and feces get full, factory farms will frequently get around water pollution limits by spraying liquid manure into the air, creating mists that are carried away by the wind"
#9 Milk contains Casein: the mucous producing, addictive antigen.
"Eighty percent of milk protein is casein, the mucous producer. Casein from cow's milk is a foreign protein. When you eat this antigen, your body's immune system manufactures an antibody. The antibody is a histamine. As a result of histamine production, many people open their medicine cabinets or rush to their pharmacies in search of antihistamines."
#10 The Dairy industry supports the VEAL and beef industry:
"Approximately 17 percent of the US beef supply comes from spent dairy cows: cows who are no longer economically viable for milk production. These animals may be sold due to common diseases of milk cows including mastitis, a bacterial udder infection, foot rot, from standing long periods of time in manure, an inability to stand due calcium depletion from years of intensive milking, and Johne's disease. Johne’s disease may be transmissible to humans as Chron’s disease." ~Wikipedia
#11 Why do you think the huge dairy industry has to market so heavily? I never see campaigns for eggplant..
http://www.vegansociety.com/animals/exploitation/cows/dairy_cow.php
http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/dairy/
http://www.goveg.com/environment-pollution.asp
http://www.justeatveggies.com/animals.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dairy_cattle
http://www.notmilk.com/kradjian.html
http://www.milksucks.com/dairyleaflet.pdf
http://www.milksucks.com/index2.asp
http://www.rense.com/general38/pus.htm
http://www.antiaginglifeextension.com/health_matters_minutes/articles/milk.asp?a=1563&c=&p=
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