h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Milk - A693669
Author: Jack - U180388

This one is good!

A bit short, but the topic has potential... probably needs a lot more fleshing out

I do have a few questions and points to make:

> What's your evidence that milk increases the risk of breast cancer - and in that case, why only in women and not men as well?

> methionine is an essential amino acid; hence it is required by the body - as a result, a lot of methionine must be ingested to ensure the body is all tickety-boo...

> There are several cases in which calcium moves from the bones to the blood, but the one which the body uses to maintain its delicate internal balance is when there is a low concentration of calcium in the blood - it's essential for other things too, but I won't bore you by explaining them all here... if you raise your blood calcium, say, by eating lots of cheese, then the converse happens; calcium moves from the blood to the bones.

> A mention of milk being one of the key foodstuffs at the breakfast table would be nice

My comments are a bit heavy-duty, but please don't be intimidated! It just seems to me IMHO that the subject of Milk probably covers a lot more - it would be lovely to see you write a bit more on the topic

Stay ,
WD

I agree with Witty Ditty. There is much more which could properly be said about this subject. As well as the ones she mentions, you could mention the Chinese - by and large they don't drink milk after weaning and their bodies are not adapted for milk drinking.

You could point out the differences between organic and non-organic milk and the substances that cows are fed that are passed on to humans though milk.

Jack, really good start. Tell me, is your list of other milk sources meant to be commercially available milks or is it milk source consumed by humans in the UK or elsewhere? Its clearly not all milk sources as this would include all mammals (by definition).

You need to check a couple of spellings, I think you'll find sulphur etc is spelt with a ph not an f., and *meens* should be means.

I think the sense of the following sentence would be improved if you added commas after *body* and *problems* thus: "This means your body, to deal with this problem, drains the calcium from your bones, in fact more than the calcium coming in from the milk."

Keep up the good work.

definatley more research needed jack,

a section on milk allergies would be good, some babies are allergic, some people are allergic to the lactose in it, some ar allergic to the type of fat.

where milk comes from would also be a good section, and i dont just mean the udder, i mean what is eated and converted into milk etc.


keep going, you'll get there

FABT

Hear, hear! Big subject, limited info for the time being. More work needed but could produce a great entry.

Lots of good suggestions from others in this thread. If ye have ears, then listen and learn the ways of the Edited Guide.

Look forward to reading next time round.

Btw, one other little type 'should only be drUnk in small amounts.

Seeya
Spiff

It's all ready been said but. It's a good entry, informitive, and short. Key word being short. If you could lengthen the entry maybe 20 more lines and give us more on the effects of milk. Then you might have something.

heart of Darkness

As regards allergies etc, I am a bit of an expert as my son could not tolerate cows milk in any form for the first 6 years of his life, and I am intolerant. I can give you a list af all the derivatives of milk.

As WD says, calcium moves between the bones and blood - check out my soon to-be-Edited Entry on A682454 Postmenopausal Osteoporosis for more info.

There are many more places to get milk besides the ones you list. All mammals produce milk. You could drink cat milk if you had a mind to.

... and of course, there is human milk, which you could raise the whole 'breast vs bottle' debate and the pro/cons; but perhaps that is better raised in a separate entry.

And if I were to be *really* pedantic, you could mention dandylion milk...

Stay ,
WD

You could even stretch it into man-milk.

Argh! I knew this would happen - post one point, and another one hits you as soon as you hit the post button...

You might want to mention that although 'milk allergy' is a common term, it is not strictly an allergy in the same sense as, say, seasonal asthma or nut allergies are - these are inflammatory processes which make you come out all red and blotchy, itching or at the worse - anaphalaxis.

The 'milk allergy' doesn't make you do this, but can be broken down into two categories;

> An enzyme deficiency in the small bowel: this enzyme is called lactase and is deficient in a few people of certain ethnic origins. Lactose is the sugar primarily found in milk, and it would ordinarily get broken down by this enzyme. However, if it is missing, the sugar will travel onwards and downwards into the large intestine.
Within the colon (medicky term for the large intestine), there are some very friendly bacteria which live quite happily without any problems to you. They live off sugars, and produce hydrogen as a waste product. With the additional lactose arriving at the colon, then the bacteria are only too happy to eat it all up. However, a lot of gas is produced in the meantime, leading to the characterisic uncomfortable bloating and colicky pain relieved by, yes, flatulence and defecation. Hydrogen gas breath tests can be done to determine whether those bacteria are being fed too well, but I've forgotten the gold-standard test for this condition...

>Milk intolerance associated with the irritable bowel syndrome: to which there is no disease process (hence 'syndrome' and not 'disease'), and the bowel wall is, to all accounts, completely normal. Some people with IBS (symptoms of bloating, colicky pain, gurgling, constipation and general abdominal pain) may find that their symptoms ease by cutting out milk, but in the long term, there is no evidence to show that dietary changes lead to relief of the symptoms.
To summarise, we have absolutely no idea what is going on here - if world experts in the field don't know, then really there is no chance of me being to explain it here either

Now, as soon as I hit the post button, I hope I don't come up with another point...

Stay ,
WD

I did find one word misspelling *means*. Maybe you could go with The manufacturing processes involved. That would be interesting. Maybe Mr. Pastuer's Contribution. I don't think I could add any thing that has'nt been said. Good Luck with it.
TheKID

That's really interesting WD. However, you don't mention the protein, which is probably what my son was having trouble with. Not the sugars at all. (I'm not trying to be critical as such, more interested in how it affects him.) It doesn't describe my symptoms either. (Not that I know what my sypmptoms are!)

That's quite interesting - I'll have to look that up Time to get out the big path. book again...

Just a sec... *flick, flick*

Of course, we weren't told any of this. It took 6 months for the doc to try my son (a tiny baby - losing weight on soya milk. Then we worked out which of the ingredients he could cope with. A long trial! Now his body seems to be developed enough to cope - although like me, he'll probably be better off the less he eats.

Sorry, OT I know, but milk is a bit of a hobby horse of mine.

Problem is, I don't have any books on paediactric stuff, so I may not be able to provide an explanation re your son (I'm not trying to avoid the subject - just that I don't want to attempt to comment on an aspect I've had no experience or teaching in... safer that way )

The only reason that I mention the allergy term is that it is a word which is used by many to describe a multitude of stuff, when it is a precise disease process - just my pedantry with medical terminology I guess...

I'll do some more reading anyways... *flick, flick*

Stay ,
WD

Right, rather than me do a cack-handed job of explaining something I don't really know, I'll let a peer reviewed book do the talking:

http://www.merck.com/pubs/mmanual/section19/chapter256/256h.htm

I think that is similar to what you are talking about

But this link on carbohydrate intolerance may be worth putting into the entry itself:

http://www.merck.com/pubs/mmanual/section3/chapter30/30b.htm

Yes, it is a US publication, and yep, it's got all nasty medicky terms in there too, but it's just so concise, and there's a fluffy bunny version online (and most importantly, free) too

Now, I'll promise I'll go

Stay ,
WD

I think you all are running out of ideas to give this person.

heart of Darkness.

ps. let him/her fix it.

Will you guys help me?
This entry has been moved to the writing workshop.

LW
(That's Jack if you didn't know )