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Camels Milk

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monika schulz

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watched and read a rescent article on the properties of Camels milk, then decided to check the diabetic forum about Camels milk but was rather disappointed on the results as the replies i read tended to humour about it. Im off tomorrow to a camels farm here in Cyprus where i placed an order for 2 litres. Apparently it has proven to work so i am ready to try it, as it has many other properties too. here is the link.camelmilkuk.net
 
Hello, sorry I am confused. Proven to work what? If anything like goats' milk I would avoid, as I hate it! It tastes how the animal smells! Good luck, please advise how much it costs and how many gulps you had before chucking it down the drain!
 
Ha ha! That made me smile. Does it make lumpy milkshakes?
 
Yet another version of the ever popular miracle cure...

If any credible study were to show that bitter melon, green coffee, camel milk, cinnamon, or any other substance possessed the magical property to reduce weight or lower blood sugar, the active ingredient would have been isolated, standardised, and offered by the medical profession long ago. Any pharmaceutical maufacturer would jump at the chance to provide the cure for the modern day plague. Just imagine the gold mine that would be.

Those who drink camel milk as a staple of their diet generally come from areas where intensive modern farming practices are not used. Their diet will naturally be more basic and not contain the refined sugars and processed foods of our diets. Think about it. It's less likely to be the camel milk than it is just a healthier lifestyle that has been followed by generations by people who have no doubt adapted to that lifestyle. And I don't think it's any coincidence that any culture that starts to import products from the Americas and/or Europe starts to experience a rise in obesity and diabetes.

Could it be that the same medications given to livestock to increase their fertility, produce more milk, or help them gain weight faster for the market are also affecting humans? Could it be that the residue of antibiotics given daily to those same livestock to keep them healthy until slaughter are causing changes to the flora in the human gut? Could it be that residual pesticides, many of them being neurotoxins, are affecting the ability of the human brain to regulate hormones and metabolism? Could it be that herbicides that are used on the wheat and cereal crops also end up in our bread? What about oral contraceptives that don't break down in the environment and are affecting the wildlife, are they also affecting the endocrine system of the person using them? Could it be that all of these in combination are working against us? Bring in what we are learning from the study of epigentics and suddenly a whole new realm of suspects comes to light.

If "we" are doing this to ourselves - just who are the "we"? The people eating the food, the people growing and manufacturing the food, the manufacturers of the chemicals and medications, or the governments that regulate their use?
 
According to various articles on the internet (can't vouch for authenticity), it was in the First Century that the Greek physician Aretaeus coined the term "diabetes". Diabetes is from the Greek word meaning to siphon (apparently). The relationship between the term "to siphon" and the disease is because people with diabetes were said "to siphon" off fluids from the body through excess urination.

My point is that the condition seems to be far older than the modern world. We are noticing it more now due to advances in medicine and ability to 'screen' on a global scale. Is the increase in diagnosis of T2 due to more people acquiring it or more people being screened, or is it all the things we can cite, from chemicals to sugar, to environment etc. or a combination of all of these?

I do not recall being tested for diabetes as a child and so I have no idea when I acquired it (diagnosed 4 years ago), although I do remember schoolmates having to take insulin (I presume T1). I do remember that the 'hypos' I experience now are the same as I have experienced throughout my life (usually dealt with by a snack from a food machine!) and my mother was diagnosed (rather late in the day) in her sixties (20 years or so ago) as the 'classic' complications started to appear.

On a brighter note, I would rather be one of the diagnosed rather than the greater number who aren't as it has helped with the quality and enjoyment of the food I eat, my weight, hopefully better control of my health in general, and, of course, the opportunity to discuss diabetes on forums like this (crawl! crawl!)
 
 
Monika Shulz --

I didn't spend my time studying organic chemistry, genetics, and biology so that I could believe every fast-talking snake oil salesman that comes along or buy into every miracle cure that Dr. Oz or the Natural News pretend is legitimate by citing official looking studies conducted by self-proclaimed 'doctors' that somehow defy reason and scientific fact to produce exactly the fantastic results needed to convince those who don't know any different. The world is full of gullible people willing to waste their money on magic and plenty more who are morally vacant enough to take advantage of them.

Mocking people and calling them ignorant will not convince anyone that myth and fantasy are better than real science.

Frankly, I'd rather visit the local witch doctor than buy camel's milk -- at least I'd get a good show for my money!

By the way -- the humpy-lumpy jokes are a hoot... got any more???
 

Take a look on the Limmerick topic....hope you enjoy ... in the meantime....

My thoughts exactly. I am a 'mature' student' mid-way through a Life Sciences degree (biology, chemistry & physics) and understand more now about theories, experiments & conclusions etc. not to mention retesting the theory (Newcastle Diet comes to mind). I have asked a few times on this site if anyone who is cured or reversed their diabetes has had a glucose tolerance test (e.g bottle of lucozade then blood test two hours later) and have been met with a wall of silence. That's how I was diagnosed and that may convince me there could be something in it.

It beggars belief what some 'scientists' spend their time on looking into. Who's paying them? (the tax payer or 'sponsor' perhaps?). It seems that some scientists are rushing just to get something/anything eyecatching published which many people will, of course, swallow. I've lost count of the number of times coffee has been both good and bad for us over the years. I drink about 10 mugs of freshly-brewed coffee a day and can still sleep at night, unless I believed someone who told me I couldn't. I must be a freak!!
 
I don't know of any claimed benefits of camels milk but the Bedouin are a camel milk drinking culture and they possess a genetic mutation which allows continued production of the lactase enzyme in adulthood. Lactase is required to digest the carbohydrate lactose found in milk. Several populations have such mutations, the red/orange one in the map below, but each geographic area has its own genetic mutation. In northern europe for example, it is a C => T transition at 13910 Kb.

But it does go to show that whilst some people cannot digest some carbs, others can, even if via different genetic mechanisms, and that we are not all the same when it comes to what we can and cannot eat.

 

I am having difficulty understanding your chart. I presume 'C' is carbs, but what is 'T', and why is your unit of measurement Kb (kilobytes)? However, since the chart seems to show the whole of the British Isles as being in the red/orange (can't zoom in), then the OP has a reasonable chance of tolerating camel's milk.

Like you, I have no idea of other benefits of camels' milk over other, but, from a diabetic point of view, they will either see no significant change in their bG or it will increase or decrease, which is pretty much the case with all foods we eat containing carbs.

I hope, for their sake, it doesn't taste of camel. :twisted:
 

I think you're on the right track with the GTT idea. Even though my daily readings and HbA1C appear fairly normal and the outward symptoms of insulin resistance are gone, a GTT shows I have both diabetes and reactive hypoglycaemia. I get a prolonged high every time and that drops suddenly to a hypo. In a strange way I'm pleased with that because my T2 relatives were further along in the progression at the same age. I think buying time is really all we can ever do, there is no cure or reversal, only slowing the clock and I seem to have slowed my clock.

Camel milk is just milk, not magic, and there is no scientific basis for any of the claims. There is however some recent promising research that has found that re-balancing intestinal bacteria can restore the leptin response, reduce insulin resistance, and induce weight loss in obese mice that are free fed. Studies of humans have shown that a high percentage of obese people have the same bacterial imbalance as the mice. Not sure if it's cause or effect but it's a simple and logical idea shows real promise. That's what I prefer to believe in, not miracle cures. Real reasons for a real problem that could possibly be treated rather than just managed.
 

Yes, as far as I am concerned, I am diabetic, irrespective of readings, unless a real cure or reversal treatment appears. As we know, the pancreas does not regenerate, so what's gone is gone, and the only way to deal with it is to give it less to do. There is probably better hope for those with insulin resistance than a ******** pancreas, given the massive genetics industry. But I am comfortable with my nutritional lifestyle.We should feel lucky that we have been diagnosed and in a better position in terms of knowledge, treatment and advice than, say, our parents or older relatives. There are, of course, many other parts of the body to look after as well, hence no low-carb diet for me. Even DUK doesn't advocate low-carb, but says it seems to help some people but should be done under strict medical supervision (hope I've paraphrased correctly).
 
gezzathorpe said:
I am having difficulty understanding your chart. I presume 'C' is carbs, but what is 'T', and why is your unit of measurement Kb (kilobytes)?
Click to expand...

No C is the nucleotide Cytosine. The T stands for Thymine. The four nucleotides, guanine, adenine, thymine and cytosine are basic building blocks in DNA. You have 23 pairs of chromosomes and the sequence of nucleotides on one chromosomal strand are bonded to paired nucleotides on the other strand, rather like rungs on a ladder, except the two strands are twisted in a helix:



Cytosine is always paired with guanine and thyamine always paired with adenine. The C to T, or C => T transition is a copying error during replication. Where there should be a cytosine/guanine pairing or 'rung', there is a thyamine/adenine pairing. The 13910 Kb refers to the position of this mutant rung on the ladder. Starting at 0 with the bottom rung, you count 13,910,000 rungs up, and you're in the right area. If you have a look at this gene (AMY1), you'll see the nucleotides in sequence, 100 per line from 12851.8 Kb up to 12854.4 Kb http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... Y1gene.png

Looking at the map again



The red areas in northern europe indicate the frequency of the C => T transition at 13910 Kb, at 90% or above, the orange C => T between 80% and 90% and so on, decreasing in frequency as we go through the colour bands. As you say, most people in the UK can drink milk, although strictly speaking the C => T transition at 13910 Kb means that they produce the enzyme lactase which enables them to digest the carbohydrate lactose, the sugar found in milk. Most people in the world do not produce the enzyme lactase in adulthood. Production is normally switched off in the teens. A couple of other cultures also have mutations which allows lactase to be produced in adulthood, the cattle rearing Tutsi tribe of sub saharan Africa and the Bedouin pastoralists who traditionally drank camel's milk for example. There are 4 geographic areas where the population have high frequencies of what is known as a LP (Lactase Persistence) gene. Each however appears to have its own mutation which causes it. The general area on the chromosome which controls it is known as the MCM6 gene and the specific locations of the mutations which allow LP are -13910*C, -13,907*G, -13,915*G and -14,010*C. Any copying error at these loci, ie a T where a C should be or an A where a G should be and lactase production does not get switched off. There may be others of course, but we haven't found them. What is evident however is that the mutations are highly correlated with geographic regions. This is what we would expect as they are rare for a given location and are deemed to have happened only once, in one person, at some time in the past. The only reason why a gene propagates throughout a population in later generations, is because it conveys some sort of selective advantage.
 

And for the non-scientists ....

The geographic regions of Europe, western Africa, a small part of India, and a small part of east/north eastern Africa began as pastoral societies. Today, people living in these countries are primarily the descendants of those early populations. In pastoral cultures,where milk became a lifelong source of food,the ability to digest lactose provided individuals with an adaptive advantage that increased their evolutionary fitness. Through natural selection, individuals with the lactase-persistence mutation were
more likely to survive and produce offspring.As a result, the mutation and associated trait increased in frequency.

So, if you an indigenous Brit who is not lactose-intolerant, camels' milk should be fine .... cheers
 
The interesting point is that out of many millions of nucleotides a change to just one of them enables the production of one enzyme which is required to digest just one type of sugar which has major consequences.

It's worth bearing in mind when people with diabetes wonder why one food is OK for them whilst other, apparantly similar, foods don't work for them but do work for other people. I think it is a good idea not to expect a one diet fits all is possible. There are big differences from small changes.
 
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