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By Matthew Rees

Food and Health Fact #123: Does milk actually do a body good?

Find all previously published Food and Health Facts here

What are the health benefits of drinking animal-based milk? When two Harvard professors, Walter Willett and David Ludwig, examined this issue by reviewing more than 100 studies, they came to a striking conclusion: the evidence in support of the federal government’s recommendation to consume three daily servings of reduced fat, animal-source milk is “surprisingly thin.”

In a summary article published in February 2020, they addressed several misconceptions about the benefits of milk consumption. (The full article was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.) For example, “the most common health reason for drinking milk is to strengthen bones, to create a ‘bank’ for calcium throughout life and prevent fractures. None of this seems to be true — at least for the general population.” They also found that milk intake levels were unrelated to hip fracture rates. As for health risks, they pointed to links between milk consumption and prostate cancer in men and endometrial cancer in women, while noting that milk consumption may help prevent colorectal cancer.

“There is no human requirement to drink the milk of other animals,” concluded Willett and Ludwig. “All the nutrients in milk can be obtained in the necessary amounts from other dietary sources. For calcium, alternative sources include kale, broccoli, nuts, seeds, beans, sardines, and other whole foods.”