What are the benefits of milk? What difference does it make whether you drink it or not? Can drinking it really help you grow taller?

It depends on how you say it. Milk is also nutritious. No matter what you eat, as long as the nutrients your body needs are sufficient and balanced, what does it matter whether you drink milk or not? Space-Time Communication believes that it is okay to have no milk or meat, no meat or fish, no fish eggs, and there are also various staple foods and vegetables. As long as the nutrients your body needs are supplemented and the nutrients and elements contained in milk are not lacking, then let the milk go.

Also, for an individual, for a short period of time, drinking or not drinking doesn't matter much; but for a region or a nation, for a long period of time, drinking or not drinking makes a big difference. In order to clarify this issue, today I will talk with my friends in detail. After everyone reads patiently, you will understand everything.

Let’s first look at the nutritional content of milk:

The above two milk nutrition tables circulating on the Internet have different data, which shows that the things on the Internet are not imperial decrees and there is no unified answer. It also shows that the content of milk ingredients from different manufacturers or different varieties is different, but the main calories, protein, fat, calcium and other trace elements, vitamins, etc. are not much different. The biggest feature of milk is the high calcium content, which is between 104 and 169 mg per 100 grams.

Then let's take a look at the calcium content and other nutrients of some major foods:

Only the main ingredients are listed here.

The proportion of the main chemical elements in the human body.

The most abundant element in the human body is oxygen, which accounts for 65%. This is actually because the water content in the human body is more than 70%. The second most abundant element is carbon, which accounts for 18%. The third most abundant element is hydrogen, which accounts for 10% and nitrogen, which accounts for 3%. From this score, we can see that the four elements of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen in the human body account for 96% of the weight. Therefore, people need to breathe and drink water, and consume enough carbohydrates every day to make up for the metabolism of these elements.

But in addition to these four elements, the human body also contains more than 60 elements, of which 15 are very important, such as calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, chlorine, sulfur, magnesium, iron, silicon, zinc, copper, manganese, cobalt, iodine, and molybdenum. If they are lacking, you cannot stay healthy and will get sick. The human body also contains some other trace elements and needs various vitamins. Today I will mainly talk about milk, and I won’t talk about the rest here.

The main compounds and elements that the human body needs to replenish on a daily basis.

Carbohydrates, fats, and proteins are the substances that the human body requires in the largest quantities. An adult needs to consume (kg body weight/gram) the following per day: 7.5g carbohydrates, 1-1.5g fat, and 0.8-1.2g protein (2.5g for athletes).

There are dozens of elements in the human body, which guarantee the growth and development of the human body and the need to maintain normal metabolism. Here are just a few of the most important trace elements that need to be consumed daily (adults/mg): sodium 2000mg, potassium 2000mg, calcium about 1000, phosphorus 700mg, magnesium 350mg, iron 15mg, zinc 15mg, copper 2mg, fluorine 1.5mg, iodine 150ug, selenium 50ug, chromium 50ug.

In the comparison of the food charts above, these elements are distributed in various regular foods. When people consume food, as long as the nutrition is balanced, they can meet their needs. The nutrients contained in milk do not have any special ingredients, and it seems that drinking it or not is not a big deal. So why is drinking milk becoming more and more popular as society progresses, and some countries have even passed laws to force teenagers to drink milk?

In fact, the most important function of milk for the human body is to supplement calcium.

This is because calcium is very important to the human body.

The total amount of calcium in a normal person's body is about 700~1400g, of which 99% is bound and precipitated on hard tissues such as bones and teeth, and 1% is dissolved in the blood and soft tissues. Calcium not only plays an important role in promoting the development of bones, but also regulates cell functions; affects the activity of various enzymes in the body; maintains normal excitement of nerves and muscles together with magnesium, potassium, sodium and other ions; participates in the coagulation process as a coagulation factor; reduces the permeability of cell membranes and capillaries; and inhibits inflammation and edema.

Therefore, calcium deficiency not only affects bone development and causes bone brittleness, but also leads to a series of diseases. Calcium deficiency in children will lead to stunted growth, short stature, and bone deformation; calcium deficiency in the elderly will lead to osteoporosis, bone deformity, pathological fractures, muscle cramps, bone pain, laryngeal and bronchial spasms, epileptic seizures, and a series of other diseases.

It can be seen how important calcium is to the human body. The human body needs to supplement 700~1500mg of calcium every day, of which children generally need about 700mg, adults generally need more than 1000mg, and after entering old age, it should increase to 1200~1500mg. The required calcium is mainly supplemented in the food consumed daily.

There is a lot of calcium in common foods, so why do we have to drink milk?

Common foods with relatively high calcium content include (per 100g): fish and shrimp, such as river shrimp 325mg, sea shrimp 146mg, dried shrimp 555mg, dried shrimp skin 991mg, and sea bass 138mg; beans, such as black beans 224mg, soybeans 191mg, and tofu 164mg; vegetables, seaweed 264mg, edamame 135mg, lentils 137mg, rapeseed 108mg, etc. The calcium content in meat is not high, such as beef 24mg, lean pork 14mg, chicken 11mg, etc. The calcium content in eggs is not high either, such as 56mg for eggs, and the calcium is mainly in the yolk, 62mg for duck eggs.

Rice and flour also contain a certain amount of calcium, about 10 mg in rice and about 30 mg in flour; the calcium content in fruits is relatively low, basically below 100 mg.

From the above introduction, we can see that there are some foods that are high in calcium. Even if we don’t drink milk, we can still take in the calcium that the human body needs. But why do we still encourage people to drink milk? Simply put, it is convenient, easy to obtain, high in calcium, and easy to absorb.

Every 100g of milk contains about 100~160mg of calcium, so if you take 250~300g of milk every day, you can get more than 300~500mg of calcium, which can supplement half of an adult's daily calcium needs. Drinking a few hundred milliliters of milk a day is as simple and easy as drinking water, but if you want to supplement calcium with other foods, you have to eat a lot and insist on eating it every day, which is more troublesome and difficult.

For example, if you eat soybeans, can you eat 300 grams of soybeans every day? Can you stick to eating 100 grams of dried shrimps every day? Can you bear to eat fish and shrimps every day? And there is more trouble. The nutrients in milk are high-quality nutrients and are very easy to be absorbed by the body, while some vegetables with high calcium content are not necessarily so easy to absorb. For example, the calcium in dried shrimps can only be absorbed by the human body in a small proportion, so if you want to supplement the calcium needs, you should eat more.

These factors are the reasons why we are encouraged to drink milk. In addition, milk also contains many nutrients such as protein and vitamins, which can also make up for the lack of food intake. These nutrients are also found in other foods, and each has its own advantages, so I won’t talk about them in detail. Anyway, I think the biggest function of drinking milk is to supplement calcium, but we must also pay attention to the nutritional balance of our daily diet. We should change the intake of eggs, meat, and vegetables to ensure the required nutrition and calcium intake.

Children and the elderly in particular should pay attention to calcium intake and balanced nutrition.

I won't say much about children here, because now China has escaped poverty, and children grow up under the care of their parents. They can get their nutritional needs met by drinking milk, but they should pay attention to correcting their partial eclipse from an early age. Elderly people and women entering menopause should focus on calcium supplementation. Generally, people start to lose bone mass when they reach the age of 50 to 60, so calcium supplementation is particularly important at this time. The best way to supplement calcium is to develop the habit of drinking milk.

Calcium supplementation mainly relies on food, and try not to rely on calcium tablets and other medicines. The most important source of food calcium supplement is milk, so the elderly should drink more, at least 250g of fresh milk a day, 500g is better, so that they can supplement 300-500 mg of calcium every day, which is almost half of the body's needs. Then, selectively eat some high-calcium foods to ensure calcium intake.

In addition to calcium, other nutrients must also be well matched. Some elderly people have some high blood pressure and cardiovascular problems, so they don't eat this or that, which makes their faces pale all day long. Malnutrition reduces resistance and will aggravate the disease. Normal nutritional intake is still necessary, one egg, two taels of meat and fish every day, plus some beans and vegetables, enough nutrition, the body can be strong.

In addition to nutritional intake, you also need to exercise appropriately. The exercise I am talking about does not necessarily require doing difficult movements such as splits or yoga. Just walking and doing some light exercises to stretch your muscles and bones will be enough. You should also get some sun exposure frequently, because the ultraviolet rays in the sun are absorbed by the human skin and converted into vitamin D3 through a series of chemical reactions. Then, the liver and kidney hydroxylases act to generate active vitamin D, which can promote calcium absorption through the body's biological effects.

If you don't get enough sun, it will be difficult to absorb calcium even if you take it, so you have to take vitamin D3. There is a drug called calcitriol that works well to enhance intestinal calcium absorption, but you must follow the doctor's advice, otherwise taking too much may lead to hypercalcemia.

Milk has helped the Japanese change their image of "Wa".

This is a typical case in which a large group of a nation promoted drinking milk, which led to a significant improvement in their overall physical fitness.

In the past, old people often called Japanese people "Japanese dwarfs". This statement is not groundless or deliberately derogatory. Research data shows that the height of Chinese people was indeed significantly higher than that of Japanese people before World War II. It is not a comparison between one person and one person, but a big data comparison between many people. According to historical data from the Dutch Clio lnfra database, in the early 19th century, the average height of Chinese men in the Qing Dynasty was about 165cm, while the Japanese at that time was only 155cm.

In ancient times, the Japanese were even shorter, with men generally only 150cm tall, so they were called "Japanese pirates" by Chinese border residents.

After World War II, the Japanese government promulgated the School Lunch Law in 1954, which put forward the slogan "A glass of milk strengthens a nation". It stipulated that the government would provide free fresh milk to each student in grades 1 to 3 of elementary school every day, and the amount would be rationed according to the physical needs of the age group. In addition, free nutritious lunches were provided, with recipes formulated by specialized nutritionists, and about 30 kinds of food were eaten every day.

Drinking milk and improving overall nutrition have allowed the post-war Japanese to thrive. The biggest change is a significant increase in height. According to data from 1914 to 2014, the height of Japanese adults has increased a lot, with men increasing by 14.65cm and women increasing by 16.01cm! This miracle was mainly created in the half century from 1948 to 1998, because during World War II, the Japanese were only about 1.5 meters tall and were called "Japanese dwarfs" by the Chinese.

In my country, the height of men and women increased by only 10.86cm and 9.55cm respectively during the same period. The result is that the average height of Japanese people has not only caught up with that of Chinese people, but has even surpassed that of Chinese people. In 2010, there was a world population height ranking, with the average height of Chinese people at 169.7cm, ranking 32nd, and that of Japanese people at 170.7cm, ranking 29th.

Here is a set of statistics from the end of the last century:

In 1997, the State Sports Commission of China conducted a physical fitness survey of adults in 19 provinces across the country, with the subjects being citizens aged 18 to 59. A total of 105,328 samples were collected, including 55,980 males. The statistical results were compared with the 1997 Japanese Physical Fitness Survey Report of the Sports Bureau of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Tourism of Japan, and the results were as follows:

The average height of Chinese men in the 18-29 age group is 3cm taller than that in the 57-59 age group, which shows that young people are taller than old people, and the Chinese themselves are growing taller; but compared with Japanese men, the height of Chinese men tends to be lower than that of Japanese men, mainly because Chinese men aged 59 are still 2.6cm taller than their Japanese counterparts, while those aged 18 are 1.3cm shorter.

Compared with different age groups, it is more difficult to see this changing trend clearly: Chinese men aged 50-59 are 1.52cm higher than Japanese men of the same age group, 40-49 are 0.03cm lower than Japanese men of the same age group, 30-39 are 0.68cm lower than Japanese men of the same age group, and the 18-29 age group is 1.04cm lower than Japanese men of the same age group.

The above data show that as of the end of the last century, the Japanese had a greater trend of height growth than the Chinese. Even if the average height of men in both countries is calculated as 170cm, the height of Chinese men has only increased by 5cm compared to the Qing Dynasty, while the Japanese have increased by 15cm!

Although this result is not only achieved by drinking milk, I think the contribution of popularizing milk drinking among the nation's young people and children is at least 30%.

The Chinese are now growing taller faster than the Japanese!

This is the dividend brought by reform and opening up. After reform and opening up, China's social economy has developed rapidly, and material resources have been greatly enriched, which naturally enriched people's dining tables and nutrition. According to statistics, my country's milk production in 1980 was 1.14 million tons, reaching 32.01 million tons in 2019, and is expected to reach 60 million tons in 2023, an increase of 50 times in 40 years! Of course, other meat, fish, poultry and eggs have also grown synchronously, so I won't go into details here.

The benefits of the milk campaign launched in Japan in the 1950s were almost exhausted by the end of the last century, and height growth showed a downward trend. According to research data published by the National Center for Child and Adult Health in Japan in 2017, Japanese men and women born in 2014 were 1.5cm and 0.6cm shorter, respectively, than those born between 1978 and 1979.

This data is interesting. Why did they become shorter? Could it be that they drank too much milk in their early years and got tired of it, so they stopped drinking it later? Just like a spoiled child who becomes picky about food, and then has an unbalanced nutrition? Of course, this is just a wild guess, without any data to support it.

Rich nutrition nourishes the growth of Chinese people, and the height of Chinese people has begun to grow. In contrast to the shorter height of Japanese young people, the height of Chinese young people continues to increase. According to a survey conducted by a British research team in 2016, the average height of 18-year-old young people in China is 171.8cm for males and 159.7cm for females; in Japan, it is 170.8cm and 158.3cm respectively. This fully shows that young people born after the 1990s have enjoyed the dividends of reform and opening up, and milk has certainly played a big role in this.

If the average height of the three generations of old, middle-aged and young people is included, the current average height of the Japanese is still higher than that of the Chinese. However, according to professional analysis, in another half century, the average height of the Chinese will exceed that of the Japanese.

Having said so much, is it just to say that you must drink milk? No. I still can't say that everyone must drink milk. If you can ensure calcium supplementation and balanced nutrition in other diets, you can completely abandon the "bad habit" of drinking milk. But for me personally, drinking milk to supplement calcium is really a good, convenient and affordable thing.

The above suggestions are for reference only. Thank you for reading and welcome to discuss.

The copyright of Space-Time Communication is original. Infringement and plagiarism are unethical behavior. Please understand and cooperate.