A person on my mental "asshole" list is in the news! Terry Etherton just published a new study "proving" no meaningful difference between three kinds of milk: conventional, rBGH-free, and organic. Before you consider the findings of the study, consider THIS:
- Monsanto funded the study
- Monsanto staff collected the samples
- The study was mostly written by Monsanto employees, with the help of Terry Etherton and his wife.
- Terry Etherton has been funded by Monsanto.
- The analysis of IGF-1 was conducted by Monsanto.
Small surprise then that they found no meaningful differences in the 3 kinds of milk. I'm a little bit shocked they didn't decide that the rBGH milk was healthier than the others, actually. After all, another asshole on my list (Dale Bauman) has already concluded that rBGH is more eco-friendly.
Etherton pops up in my world every so often because he likes to blog. A whole lot. In fact, when I attended the BIO 2008 convention, the pro-GMO presenters there talked about Etherton and advised their audience to get online and start blogging, just like him. I don't think Etherton's a very good role model, though, because his tactics are very easy to see through. (For example, check out this post by Shirah from Unbossed about where Etherton gets his talking points.)
My very favorite Etherton blog post was one that claimed that only freegans opposed GMOs. Freegans? Oh please. More about the rBGH study below... |
From the report:
A trend in food labeling is to make claims related to agricultural management, and this is occurring with dairy labels. A survey study was conducted to compare retail milk for quality (antibiotics and bacterial counts), nutritional value (fat, protein, and solids-not-fat), and hormonal composition (somatotropin, insulin-like growth factor-1 [IGF-1], estradiol, and progesterone) as affected by three label claims related to dairy-cow management: conventional, recombinant bovine somatotropin (rbST) free (processor-certified not from cows supplemented with rbST), or organic (follows US Department of Agriculture organic practices).
They took 334 samples of retail milk from 48 states to analyze for their study.
Conventionally labeled milk had the lowest (P 0.05) bacterial counts compared to either milk labeled rbST-free or organic; however, these differences were not biologically meaningful. In addition, conventionally labeled milk had significantly less (P 0.05) estradiol and progesterone than organic milk (4.97 vs 6.40 pg/mL and 12.0 vs 13.9 ng/mL, respectively). Milk labeled rbST-free had similar concentrations of progesterone vs conventional milk and similar concentrations of estradiol vs organic milk. Concentrations of IGF-1 in milk were similar between conventional milk and milk labeled rbST-free. Organic milk had less (P 0.05) IGF-1 than either conventional or rbST-free milk (2.73 ng/mL vs 3.12 and 3.04 ng/mL, respectively). The macronutrient profiles of the different milks were similar, except for a slight increase in protein in organic milk (about 0.1% greater for organic compared to other milks).
The big conclusion?
Label claims were not related to any meaningful differences in the milk compositional variables measured. It is important for food and nutrition professionals to know that conventional, rbST-free, and organic milk are compositionally similar so they can serve as a key resource to consumers who are making milk purchase (and consumption) decisions in a marketplace where there are misleading milk label claims.
What is wrong with this picture?
1. Most of their samples of conventional milk were probably MOSTLY rBGH-free milk. Dairies that accept milk from rBGH-treated cows don't separate their milk into "rBGH" and "rBGH-free"... they would mix it all together.
2. The study does not measure CLA, a beneficial fatty acid found at higher levels in milk from grass fed cows.
3. The study claims that IGF-1 degrades in the digestive tract and therefore isn't absorbed intact. They forget to mention that it mostly doesn't degrade when casein is present. Oops.
4. The study claims that rBGH is denatured by pasteurization. They base that on a study that pasteurized milk at 162 degrees for 30 MINUTES (not 15 seconds).
5. They also didn't mention "somatic cell count" (a.k.a. pus), which they would most likely find in higher numbers in rBGH milk.
6. I'd also be interested in antibiotics in the milk... another negative to non-organic milk and milk from rBGH-treated cows. |
