Don’t cry over spilled milk

I’ve come across some research this past week about calcium and its relationship with our bone health.

Apparently, I was not wrong to assert that “we all know how important it is to drink our milk to allow for strong bones,” but I was dead wrong to assume we all know what we are talking about.

I came across a video on Facebook this week:

At first, I couldn’t believe it myself. Since I was in elementary school, I can remember my doctors, teachers, family and the television telling me how important milk was for the calcium in it.

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But drinking cow’s milk is not essential to human bone health.

Okay, I will give you a second to let that sink in.

Now, I didn’t just take the word of the Vox video. I don’t believe everything I see on the internet. I looked up scientific studies to either support or deny the claim in bold. The most recent study I found was from last year, and it concluded that there is no correlation between the consumption of milk and the risk of bone fracture. (You can read it in full here.)

This isn’t to say milk doesn’t contribute to health in any way at all. Claims that milk is detrimental to bone health are unfounded. There are benefits.

“…it is a good source of high biological value proteins with polyvalent roles in immune function, as well as nutrient transport and absorption and important vitamins and essential minerals.” -Paula C. Pereira

But it isn’t as important as the government and big dairy has made it out to be. So, if you aren’t a fan of milk, it’s alright. There are better ways to get your calcium and other ways to get the same benefits from other foods.

 

Recent Body Farm Findings Change Future of Forensics

Remember when I said some body farms have used pigs in taphonomic reasearch? Well, it looks like the times are changing.

Original Source

This week, the original Body Farm in Knoxville released new information that may affect an enormous amount of cases around the world.

 

It was a previously accepted practice to study decomposing animals to get information about humans. However, this new study illustrated such variance between animal and human decomposition that they become incomparable.

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“Now anthropologists and entomologists may be asked in court which studies they used to base their estimate of postmortem interval, and if they are based on nonhuman studies, their testimony could be challenged,” – Dawnie Steadman, director of the Forensic Anthropology Center

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For the study, the researchers placed fifteen of each species of pig, rabbit, and human at the Anthropology Research Facility over three seasons to assess decomposition patterns and rates.

In the study, 15 pigs, 15 rabbits and 15 human subjects were set to decompose over spring, summer and winter (5 of each per season) at the Anthropology Research Facility. Scientists were looking to analyze the patterns of insect activity and scavenging associated with decomposition as well as the rate at which each body decomposed.

In the spring, the pigs skeletonized faster than the humans. The rabbits were initially slower, but the rate of decomp took off when the maggots developed. In the summer, the pigs decomposed much faster and more completely than both humans and rabbits. Lastly, in the winter, it took 100 days before there was any insect activity, but there was scavenging. The humans seemed to make a tastier snack to the local critters as they didn’t pay much attention to the dead animals until after the human remains were picked clean.

These observations show that comparing animal and human decomposition is basically impossible. The future of forensic science and litigation will depend more on human body donations than ever before.