The Acne-Promoting Effects of Milk

Here’s the latest update, published in 2011. “Evidence for [the] acne-promoting effects of milk.” Though acne is an epidemic skin disease in Western countries, afflicting more than 85% of adolescents, acne is absent in non-Western populations, which do not consume milk and dairy products. They go on to review all the studies, which I’ve already talked about.

“By million years of evolution,” they conclude, “[the growth] signaling system of mammalian milk is exclusively and physiologically provided to the newborn only during the nursing period. The chronic ‘abuse’ of this mammalian postnatal signaling system by widespread cow milk and dairy consumption in humans of industrialized societies has been proposed to be the major cause of the acne epidemic and the more serious chronic western diseases.” There’s lots of diseases associated with unrestricted growth. So, what should we do?

“There are two solutions to this problem: the restriction of milk protein consumption”—or we somehow engineer milk that doesn’t have these effects. Either way, both “restriction of milk consumption or the generation of less [insulin-affecting] milk will have an enormous impact on the prevention of epidemic western diseases like obesity, diabetes mellitus, cancer, neurodegenerative diseases and acne.”

To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by veganmontreal.

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• Melnik BC. Evidence for acne-promoting effects of milk and other insulinotropic dairy products. Nestle Nutr Workshop Ser Pediatr Program. 2011;67:131-45.

Image thanks to UGA College of Ag / Flickr

• acne
• adolescence
• animal protein
• cancer
• dairy
• diabetes
• hormones
• insulin
• milk
• obesity
• skim milk
• skin health
• weight loss