This is a guest post by Iris Thieme
Did you know that girls are starting their periods earlier than ever, especially in Western civilization, with a current average age of 11 years, with some as early as age 9? That is NOT fun for a 9 year old! For centuries, the average age of menarche in the Dogon tribe of Mali, West Africa, as well as in rural China has been about age 16, with some as old as 19! Why is that significant? Until recently, the Dogon and the Chinese have had basically no breast, uterine or ovarian cancer, polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), endometriosis, fibroids or even acne. Why? Studies have shown that the more periods a woman has in her lifetime, the higher her risk for these gynecological problems due to more hormonal fluctuations. Hormonal fluctuations induce growth, including unwanted growth (tumors, etc.).
Dogon women have a third less cycles than the average American due to the fact that they start menstruating later, give birth to an average of 8 children, breastfeed each of their babies for 2-4 years, and they reach menopause around age 50. For over 1,000 years, their diet mainly consisted of millet, with no dairy, and only the men ate a very little meat. However, as some have recently moved into cities and have adopted a more western diet with meat and dairy, they are beginning to have the same gynecological problems as the Western world.
Studies have shown that countries with diets high in animal protein (meat and dairy) and fat have the highest estrogen levels, which causes earlier menarche, later menopause and higher blood cholesterol, which are the leading factors of breast cancer risk. On the other hand, the countries with the lowest intake of dairy, meat and fat have the lowest estrogen levels and lowest numbers of breast cancer deaths.
Girls (and boys) are much better off if they never drink or eat any dairy! Here’s why:
- Contains high levels of estrogen and progesterone – comes from pregnant cows!
- Contains six times the amount of IGF-1 (insulin-like growth factor) as human breast milk. IGF-1 is linked to tumor growth. It is formulated by nature for a baby cow to grow very rapidly (from 60-400 lbs. in 1 year!).
- Milk is loaded with fat (the #1 source of saturated fat), milk sugar (75% of people worldwide are lactose intolerant) and milk protein, which has strong links to cancer and autoimmune diseases (everyone should read the China Study by T. Colin Campbell, PhD!).
- Is loaded with toxins that bind to the fat in the milk.
Just in case you are wondering, meat has many of the same negative components and risks as dairy, and then some!
