While at the University of California at Davis, helping my youngest son with his housing plans for his sophomore year, I was wandering through the Food Sciences building looking for a bathroom, when I coincidentally found a wall mounted rack distributing dairy industry propaganda – a small magazine called the "California Dairy Dispatch – Research, Education and Service to Support the Dairy Industry" (Spring 2002). On page 6 they say, "Since dietary fat intake is known to contribute to obesity, heart disease, cancer, stroke and type 2 diabetes – conditions disproportionately high in the Hispanic population – switching to low-fat 1% milk would significantly reduce the fat intake while retaining the benefits of calcium, protein and vitamin D." They got the disease part right, but what they seem to always fail to tell the consumer is the truth about nutrition – that 1% milk is still too high in fat. Based on the calories in milk this product is 23% fat – and almost all of that is the heart attack-producing, saturated fat.1 And 2% milk is 35% fat.1 Furthermore, the claimed benefits of calcium, protein, and vitamin D are largely untrue (see the McDougall Plan book).
Even after their clear admission of full knowledge of the health hazards of their products, they continue to sell them without a warning label about all that deadly fat. Consider some of their other best-selling products: butter at 100% fat, cheese at 70% fat, and whole milk at 50% fat.1 The failure to properly warn the public of the dangers of their products will someday soon result in lawsuits similar to those that have been won against the tobacco industries.
Reference:
J Pennington. Bowes & Church's Food Values of Portions Commonly Used. 17th Ed. Lippincott. Philadelphia- New York. 1998. |
