Upvote or Never Have Strong Bones Again
Should we drink milk to strengthen bones?
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For generations, we've been told milk helps build strong bones. Only does scientific discipline back this up?
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How many of united states of america were told equally children to drink our milk because it would give us stiff basic?
The idea does make some sense. Milk contains calcium. Calcium is known to ameliorate bone mineral density.
But demonstrating a definitive link between the consumption of milk and the possession of stiff bones is harder than it sounds. The ideal study would take 2 large groups of people and randomly assign every member of one group to drink enough of milk daily for several decades, while the other grouping would drink some kind of milk placebo instead. Obviously, this is too hard to do in exercise.
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What we tin do instead is to accept many thousands of people, ask them how much milk they've been drinking over the years, and so follow them for at least a decade to run across whether the people who regularly drinkable milk are any less likely to endure from cleaved basic later on in life.
This is what happened in research published in 1997 conducted by Harvard Academy. An impressive 77,000 female nurses were followed for 10 years. The researchers establish no significant difference in the numbers of arm or hip fractures between those who drank i drinking glass of milk a week or less and those who drank two or more.
People often underestimate the amount of milk they consume, forgetting what they add to java or cereal (Credit: Getty Images)
An alternative is to take calcium supplements. Following fears of the risk of long-term side effects from taking the supplements, the aforementioned squad in New Zealand combined the data from 51 randomised controlled trials to appraise whether the benefits outweighed whatsoever risks. Over again, they found that the increment in bone strength stops after a year or two, and that calcium supplements could simply slow down –rather than halt – the loss of os mineral density in old historic period. They concluded that this was likely to translate just to a small reduction in terms of fracture rates.
When different countries take examined the aforementioned data, they have come to very unlike conclusions about their recommended daily intake of calcium. The US, for example, recommends nigh twice as much the UK or Bharat. In the U.s.a., the guideance has been for people to beverage three 8oz (227ml) glasses a day.
Studies take thrown upwardly condusing findings regarding whether milk helps protect basic or not (Credit: Getty Images)
To confuse things farther, in 2014 came the results of two big Swedish studies which led to headlines that drinking more than than three glasses of milk a day – a larger amount that most people drink – was no help to your bones and might even harm you.
For that study, researchers at Uppsala Academy and the Karolinska Plant gave people questionnaires about their milk consumption in 1987 and again in 1997. Mortality rates were examined in 2010. People were alarmed to hear that drinking a glass of milk a twenty-four hours appeared to be associated both with more broken basic, and with early deaths.
But before nosotros chuck away the milk, at that place are some big caveats.
In the Swedish studies, participants were required to estimate their milk consumption during the previous years, which is no easy task. It'due south difficult to know how much you consume with cereal, or in tea or in cooking.
The study as well throws up the perennial problem of correlation versus causation. Perhaps women who knew they had osteoporosis deliberately drank more milk in the promise of strengthening their bones. The study didn't show that drinking milk was definitely causing the fractures. And to complicate the picture further, the Swedish team found that cheese and yoghurt consumption was associated with lower fracture rates.
Swedish studies take shown that yoghurt consumption is linked to lower rates of bone breaks (Credit: Getty Images)
The researchers themselves fabricated it clear that their report would need to be replicated before it was used to give dietary advice. Others said the public should exist cautious about changing their consumption based on these results.
So until nosotros know more, the electric current weight of prove suggests that it is still OK to continue to drink milk if yous similar information technology. Information technology probably does have benefits for bone health, albeit benefits which are shorter lived than you might have hoped.
It'south besides worth keeping your bones strong through other methods such as exercise and getting enough vitamin D from your diet, from sunshine or (depending on where in the world you live) from supplements in winter.(Read more about whether everyone should be taking vitamin D supplements).
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Source: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190408-should-we-drink-milk-to-strengthen-bones
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