During the 1990s milk and dairy products received negative media coverage due to the popularity at the time of the cholesterol and saturated fat hypothesis of cardiovascular disease. In recent years, milk and dairy products have received attention for other reasons, namely the inverse association between dairy consumption and obesity. This inverse association has been well reported and is supported by a large body of evidence from both animal and human studies that show weight loss or prevention of weight gain with high calcium or dairy diets. Although the mechanisms of action of high dairy diets on obesity are not known, the most current hypothesis suggests that changes to intracellular calcium may explain the weight loss benefits. High calcium intakes can reduce cellular levels of calcium by decreasing plasma 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D levels, and this can alter cellular signalling which may upregulate fatty acid oxidation.
Because obesity is associated with an increase in mortality from vascular disease, and dairy is inversely associated with obesity, it might be expected that high dairy product consumption is able to reduce the risk of vascular mortality. In fact, this is exactly what research shows. For example, researchers1 used a meta-analysis of prospective studies on vascular disease and diabetes which also contained baseline data on dairy consumption. Using 15 such studies, the relative risk of mortality from vascular disease with a high dairy or milk consumption was 0.84 and 0.79, respectively, when compared to low consumption. For diabetes, the relative risk was 0.92 in those with a high dairy consumption, compared with those with a low consumption. These data provide further evidence that high milk and dairy consumption provide health benefits and also suggest that the cholesterol theory of heart disease is false.
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