No-Human Milks: Should One Consume These: Personal Experience

Kamalendu Chakrabarti

doi:10.4172/2376-127X.1000e108

ISSN: 2376-127X

Journal of Pregnancy and Child Health

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No-Human Milks: Should One Consume These: Personal Experience

Kamalendu Chakrabarti^*
Pediatrician, WBHS, National Trainer, Breastfeeding & Infant Feeding, West Bengal, India
Corresponding Author :	Chakrabarti Kamalendu Pediatrician, WBHS, National Trainer Breastfeeding & Infant Feeding, West Bengal, India Tel: 9163050202 E-mail: drkamalendu@gmail.com
Received January 24, 2015; Accepted January 26, 2015; Published January 27, 2015
Citation: Chakrabarti K (2015) No-Human Milks: Should One Consume These: Personal Experience. J Preg Child Health 2:e108. doi: 10.4172/2376-127X.1000e108
Copyright: © 2015 Chakrabarti K. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Introduction

During my clinical practice as a pediatrician, for many years I felt that children of any age fed with milks other than human milk suffer much more from various problems in comparison to those who were not. Although my gut feeling was that there must be something wrong with the milk, but the scientific literatures idealize animal milk as a good food for humans. It is imperative to mention that this led to confusion and struggle, which went on within me for a long time, and I was not very sure what I should advise children to be fed upon. I was not exposed to the “Human Lactation Management Training” conducted by BPNI then. In 1993, I had the opportunity to have a four-day course of HLMT & BFHI. After returning from the said training course, I was led to the compulsive thinking of the fact that how come a baby is encouraged to have milk of other species to whom not a single drop of water is allowed before six month of age. Then I started talking with my pediatric colleagues and other friends regarding the problem. Some had their own views; some did not care for it. Therefore, I started observing the children and tried to find whether there is really any difference between the babies fed with animal milk or not in comparison to babies who are not given animal milk. But the problem was that most of babies irrespective of their age and breastfeeding status were given some form of the milk. My belief progressed into conviction that animal milk and tin milk definitely cause harm to the babies, and that led me to go for a short trial study entitled “Effects of elimination of all kinds of milk and milk-products other than breast milk from the diet of children of all age groups on the physical, mental and behavioral status.” This study was done during the year 2002-2003 and presented in the Asia Pacific Conference on Breastfeeding and National Convention of BPNI, New Delhi, 2003. (see the abstract attached).

In the mean time I could convince a few of my colleague and other health workers about the harmful effects of other milks. The parents started stopping giving other milks to their children and most of them reported that they are doing much better by this. I firmly believe that any milk other than breast milk definitely causes harm to the babies and is the root of many diseases not only in children but also in adults. I am sure that irrespective of the disease status, stopping other milks will surely help the children to improve the general conditions by at least 30%, if not more. Before going into my doubts, queries, observations and final convictions, I like to clarify that all that I am putting forward is my personal opinion and I will not be able to give full-proof scientific statistical data in support of my statements, because for me it is not possible to take such exhaustive procedure of data collection, control study, statistical analysis etc at the present situation.

Other milk: definition

The term ‘other milk’ is used here to designate all liquid animal milk, all kind of commercial formula used as milk drink, all types of food mixed with milk prepared at home or purchased from market (like rice-milk, roti-milk, etc & packed infant food mixed with milk), all kind of food where milk is the main base of the food (ice-cream, creamy biscuit, kheer, paneer, chhana –the hard card of milk, different kind of sweets made of milk, milk-candy etc.), all the health-drinksmost of which contain added milk powder). In other word, all kind of milk, milk-product, and food or drink mixed with or made from milk other than breast milk is hereby called other milk.

Some facts: some doubts

• We know that milk is species-specific, and tailor-made food. Do human babies change their species characters after six month of age?

• We all know the difference in composition between animal milk and human milk. How can animal milk be a suitable for humans at any age?

• It is well established that there are certain diseases known to the medical sciences where one of the etiological factors, if not the main factor, of various diseases, like allergy, asthma, pain abdomen, cow’s milk intolerance, urticaria, phosphaturia, constipation, diarrhea etc. is milk. Then why are the babies to be put to risk of these problems?

• We know that the life span and life cycle of animals are quite different from humans. A baby calf can stand within a few minuets after birth, can give birth within 2/3 years of life, and dies within 18/20 years of age. It shows how power-packed but short-lived a cow’s life is. Can the source of energy and other factors present in the body secretion from such an animal suit structures of a human body having much much slower rate of growth and development?

• In mother’s womb, union of only two microscopic cells make a complete human body (fetus) with all its structures within 9 months. What do the fetus eat during this period? It eats (indirectly) the essential elements from the human source (the mother). All the cells of the fetus thus have human qualities. If we can think hypothetically that during the fetal stage of growth and development elements required are being supplied from an animal can the human fetus retain its human qualities? Probably not. Yes, I know that this is a wild hypothesis. But we must remember that growth and development do not end with birth, the continue to progress for various years in different organ system after birth and during multiplication of cells they receive elements from contra- specific species, there must be some alteration in the quality of the cells and the organs. Will it go too far if a human child thriving on cow’s milk from early years, is called human-cow or cow-human?

• A cow does not go to school and does not learn discipline. It does obey orders unless forced. Does these affect a child who has consumed a large amount of cow’s milk. Fortunately, because a child is primarily a humane, he still retains his humanly nature with some aberration. Authorities claim that juvenile delinquents consume more than ten times of cow’s milk in comparison to the control group.

• If cow’s milk so good why does a calf spare the milk and goes for the grass? A child after leaving his mother milk has to continue milk from other species through out his life?

• Why most of the children do not relish cow’s milk? Is it that their bodies reject it, as it does not suit to their system?

• Milks of mares, mules, and pigs are chemically much more like human milk than is cow’s milk. But anyone who has tried to milk a horse can easily understand why the cow has been chosen for domestic production (Helsing E & King FS).

• One fact has to be noted that even if a grown up child or an adult consumed a reasonable amount other milk and has stopped taking it altogether, without having problem in his early days, may clearly exhibit some signs or symptoms of ailments persisting for rest of his life.

It is easy to identify a person consuming other milk

With slight change in the attitude of observation one can easily identify any child (even adult) whether a child is consumed some amount of other milk or not. Here I am putting some of my personal points:

One may suspect that person has consumed or has been consuming other milk if-

• The child/adult is very skinny and devoid of minimum body fat. (And /or)

• The child /adult is obese. (And /or)

• The bonny structure is thin.

• The look is not as bright as expected. (And /or)

• The skin is very thin or parchment-like. (And /or)

• Always feels tired. (And /or)

• Does not find interest in any thing. (And /or)

• Requires more motivation to undertake any serious business. (And /or)

• Most of the time has ‘I can not do it’ attitude. (And /or)

• Finds difficult to take the strains of life. (And /or)

• Attention span is less. (And /or)

• Either remains docile or hyperactive. (And /or)

• Gets irritated easily. (And /or)

• Make decisions that may invite problem for him or others. (And /or)

• Always demanding. (And /or)

• Unsatisfied with everything. (And /or)

• Easily distractible. (And /or)

• Has nagging nature. (And /or)

• Very obstinate and stubborn. (And /or)

• Fickle minded.

One may think that I have put any thing and every thing in the above list. It is true that if a child has so many problems how he or she handle his or her life. Luckily all do not come together in one child. Adaptability is a unique nature of human. Many such children do reasonably well in their carrier, social and family life probably because they had plenty of breast milk as well. Most importantly their parental care and guidance play an important role to overcome the shortcoming of the child. What I like to emphasize through above list that if a child is found to have one or more of the characters mentioned above and history of other milk consumption will almost certainly reveal positive.

Some personal clinical experience (not proved by scientific studies)

The following conditions are not found (or very rarely found) in children who have not taken any other milk or taken in negligible amount for a very short duration, irrespective of his breastfeeding status.

• Anorexia and feeding problems.

• Pain abdomen without any obvious reason.

• Constipation.

• Frequent attacks of diarrhea.

• Destructive nature.

• Pain in the muscles (so called growing pain).

• Persistent coughs without any obvious cause- it is often found that if a child is suffering from cough not responding to conventional therapy, it is likely that the child is taking some form of other milk and stopping milk abates cough within short time even without any medicine.

• Febrile convulsion – Real case of febrile convulsion is rarely found in a child not fed with any other milk.

• Frequent visits to clinic for different illness – the child who does not fed with other milk sees doctors less.

• Kerosene oil ingestion - such habit is probably does not occur in babies not fed with other milk.

• Intake of harmful objects – it is more common in other milk fed babies.

• Some mother insists to prescribe syrup or liquid preparations because their 9/10 years old children are unable to swallow tablet or capsule. Most of these children probably have consumed a good amount of other milk.

The list may be much longer. But here I stop. The purpose of mentioning all these is to give a serious thought regarding the effects of other milk on the physical, mental, social and psychosomatic aspects of a child. I have stopped recommending milk to all children under my care for many years. Many doctors and health workers are convinced that other milks are harmful to children and the trend is increasing. All the parents who have stopped milk are reported happy with their children. and many adults are not consuming milk themselves.

Why this write-up

With the increasing evidences of the dangers of other milk, I think that it is high time to go for serious studies about the goodness and badness of other milk. This is more important for us who are involved in IYCF trainings and programs. As a consultant for IYCF, one should have uniform idea regarding the feeding policies i.e. early initiation of breastfeeding, exclusive breastfeeding for six month, timely introduction of complementary feeds and continued breastfeeding for more than two years and not to give any other milk at any age.