How come everyone suddenly Lactose intolerant?

Question

Come on chaps...it's only just been invented as a term and suddenly everyone has it...Is it part of a new wave of fashionable diseases or disorders to have?

Answer 1

I don't know this either.....can I still have 10 points?

Answer 2

When I was younger there was no such thing as ADD. Now every other kid is on ritalin. Is this because no one had ADD back then or because it was just called "hyper kid syndome"? I think the reason for the proliferation of any disease these days is that some drug company has come up with a treatment for it. To sell their drugs, they have to make people understand that the disease exists and that they have the drug to treat it.

On a purely practical level, lactose intolerance is not a new thing. It is as old as (or older than) the human race itself. In caveman times, a child had milk until they could eat solid foods. And then, because we hadn't figured out yet about the whole raising cattle for milk and meat thing, they pretty much never had milk again. Why keep the host of enzymes around that are required to digest milk if it wasn't part of the diet anymore? So in adults these proteins aren't produced nearly as much as in children, hence the lactose intolerance.

Answer 3

No, lactose intolerance is a certified condition. The stomach is it's own ecosystem, with numerous bacteria and enzymes that perform a certain function. Lactose is broken down by Lactase, an enzyme. When the stomach does not have enough of this enzyme, then it starts to revolt, being that it is at prime temp to spoil milk, coupled with all the bacteria in there. Hence why people with this condition have extremely foul flatulence.

Answer 4

Diseases are not invented, but identified.
Someone has put it together as a syndrome and labeled it. It was always there.
Societies that depend on milk and mild products have also maintained the enzymes in the body to digest them. Other cultures might not be able to digest these foods.
I don't know what "only just been" invented means - what time frame?
I've known about it for 3 decades already.

Answer 5

My wife and I are both lactose intolerant. She developed it after having our second child, and I developed it a couple of years later. We don't know why I did, maybe because our diets are the same. Weird, but true.
Her's is much worse than mine. I can't have straight milk, or ice cream, or stuff with a lot of milk in it, but a little bit of cheese doesn't bother me. She can't have ANYTHING with even a trace amount of lactose.
The only way that I can describe the feeling that that is feels like what I've heard a heart-attack feels like. Stabbing pain in your chest at first, then the pain follows the food all the way through until it is digested. VERY painful.

Answer 6

Don't know if its fashionable, but I think loads of people have been living their lives as lactose intollerant. It seems that people are taking more of an interest in their diet and health and finding out what is making them sick.

As far as I am aw3are humans are the only creatures who drink milk after infancy. Maybe it has something to do with that?

Perhaps we don't need milk so much?

Answer 7

Not everybody gets intolerant to lactose,but most of the people do.This is because of the gradual decrease of an enzyme in the stomach that can break down lactose.This happens as age increases.It happens either due to hereditary deficiency of the enzyme right from childhood or is acquired as I said.

Answer 8

Milk protein molecules are larger and harder to digest than breast milk. Goats milk has been used in the past as a substitute for "Milk allergy" toddlers because the protein molecules are smaller thus more digestable. That's why our pets often suffer from lactose intolerance as well. I guess that means people milk is tailored made for human babies and cow milk is tailored made for calves and horse milk for colts and........well it's a no brainer. I'm not a scientist but......

Answer 9

no, it used to called "gas" "cramps" "upset stomach" and "diarrhea" after consuming milk and milk products, which is relieved by avoiding those products or taking lactase with them.

I have a close relative who suffers and didn't know about it until they were diagnosed. But since then it does seem to have become more popular. There are some communities, Adventists, Jews that are more likely to have it and it can develop at any time.

Answer 10

Its hereditary...
You may think your parents arent so you wont be....
For all you know they both or one of them may have the lactose intolerant gene but it hasnt been activated yet...so you may become lactose intolerant before them...
Its verycommon in the world today
though it doesnt seem to you....
70% of the world is LACTOSE INTOLERANT.

Answer 11

i reality the human body was not desinged to be on milk for their entire life. Look at every otehr mammal, beyond infantcy they do not drink a mothers milk, and just a few centuries ago people didn't drink milk byond infantcy. Our baby is just doing want comes naturally to it.