Is Milk Still Good For You?

How did this dairy product— long considered Mother Nature’s perfect food—become so controversial?

- Lisa Fields

WHEN PAUL ROBERT, 62, of Almere, a city near Amsterdam, was in elementary school, he wore a special badge on his coat to show that he was a member of the Milk Brigade. This meant that he drank three glasses of milk each day.

This was just one advertising campaign created by the Dairy Bureau, an organisation of dairy farmers in the Netherlands, that Robert remembers from childhood. In 1957, schools promoted the Milk Brigade, and the government-funded “school milk.”

In 1965, the Dairy Bureau introduced milk-guzzling cartoon character Joris Driepinter (George Three-Pint). “Drinking milk made him a superhero who could lift elephants,” Robert says. “Anyone in the Netherlands who is over 40 grew up convinced that milk is healthy and necessary.”

A badge and the possibility of superhuman strength didn’t convince Robert to become a lifelong milk-drinker. “I stopped drinking milk ages ago, just because I don’t like it anymore,” he says. “No idea why. It was not a conscious process.”

Decades ago, cow’s milk was touted as one of the healthiest beverages available, superior to coffee, juice, and fizzy drinks. But over time, milk has fallen from grace.

In the 1950s, Swedes drank, on average, nearly two and a half glasses of milk a day. “We’re now down to less than one glass,” says Dr. Karl Michaëlsson, a professor of surgical sciences at Uppsala University in Sweden.

Sales have dropped across Europe—by 20 per cent over the past decade in Sweden, and by about 30 per cent over the past 15 years in the United Kingdom. Finland has the world’s second highest milk consumption (behind Ireland), at 122 litres per capita per year, but that’s down 19 per cent, compared to 20 years ago.