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Comment by deepGem | Hacker News Reader

Quite honestly, I question the need to drink milk. I think it's another marketing gimmick that pushes parents to feed kids with milk. I'm yet to come across a toddler/kid who actually loves drinking milk. Most of them hate it and that's possibly for a reason.

When our daughter was born, we spoke to a lactation consultant who explained how infants wean away from breast milk naturally. She explained that it's not cow's milk that has a similar taste to breast milk, but it's bananas.

We also get bombarded with ads "If kids need to get sufficient calcium and Vitamin D, they need to drink cow's milk". I'm not sure how valid this argument this is.

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It is true that milk is a good source of vitamin D and calcium. It helps prevent things like Rickets which was why it was mandatory in schools when I was young.

It is also one of the few non-sugary examples of a kids drink so I'm quite keen on it.

I liked it when I was young.

Milk has ~26g sugar per 16oz serving. It is about 33% less sugar than an equivalent coke, but that doesn't mean it is non-sugary or anywhere close (unless you meant non-sugary in terms of it doesn't taste very sweet, regardless of actual sugar content)

The sugar is Lactose though not sucrose, it's a massively important distinction

> I'm yet to come across a toddler/kid who actually loves drinking milk.

You haven't looked very hard, then. My 2 year old loves milk and requests it so much that we're actively trying to get her to drink less (and more water). All my friends who have kids in the same rough age bracket report that their kids ask for milk, too.

My mom used to force me drink milk as a kid, simply because she believed the dairy industry marketing and wasn't educated enough to know that vitamin D and calcium could be gotten from many, many other sources.

I have been extremely lactose intolerant since childhood, so those forced milk-drinking episodes were traumatic.

These days I get my calcium from dark leafy greens, sardines, and tofu. I get my vitamin D from sunlight and an easily absorbable vitamin supplement.

I can assure you, children in communist countries were pushed to drink milk - without any profit motive involved.

I think this has more to do with 'common knowledge' of what's healthy.

It's also certainly better to have your kid drinking milk, over sugar waters, like sodas, most fruit juices...

Yep it's way better to have kids drink milk than sodas and even bottled fruit juices.

I love milk. Left to my own devices, I go through between half a gallon and a gallon a day. With my family (1 daughter's lactose intolerant and drinks a lactose-free milk), I go through about a gallon a day on average of regular milk and maybe a quarter of that of the lactose-free stuff. I am aware that there are people who don't like milk, but I don't really get it, other than by analogy to foods I hate.

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