Milk From Grass-Fed Cows Helps To Reduce Risk of Heart Attacks

Drinking whole-fat milk from pasture-grazing diary cows may help you to reduce your chances of having a heart attack.

This is according to a new study released by Hannia Campos from the Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, and 2 other researchers.

They studied more than 3600 people living in Costa Rica, and found that those people with more conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) in their body fat has a lower risk of heart attack when compared to the others with lower CLA in their bodies.

Dairy products are the main source of CLA, which is produced by the cows as they digest grass. Pasture-grazing dairy cows have more CLA in their milk than do grain-fed cows.

This is why Costa Rica was chosen for the study, as the country uses traditional pasture-grazing for dairy cows.

One interesting note from the study is that even though there is usually a strong risk associated with saturated fat intake from whole-fat milk, diary intake by itself was not associated with the risk of heart attacks.

Published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the study concludes that CLA, which is present in meaningful amounts in the milk of pasture-grazed cows, might offset the adverse effect of the saturated fat content of dairy products.