Oddbean

the dose makes the poison. it's not the calcium that is the issue - but the amount of it in dairy. excess calcium can potentially calcify your arteries. likewise mega-dosing synthetic Vitamin D ( as opposed to getting your Vitamin D from food and sun ) can also calcify your arteries as Vitamin D is key in allowing you to absorb calcium and when you take too much you absorb too much calcium. with anything natural in Human diet ( like Calcium ) it's not a question of good or bad but how much is too much or not enough. babies need mega-doses of calcium because they are born with under-developed short, soft bones which must rapidly lengthen and solidify. adult calcium needs are more modest. furthermore most people are deficient in magnesium which calcium competes with. high dose calcium will flush magnesium out of your body making you even more deficient. it's a lose-lose situation. luckily the calcium in dairy is mostly in the casein / cheese. in fact when you buy casein it is sometimes called "calcium caseinate" ... a single serving of Casein Protein provides 50% of Calcium RDA - that is NOT a good thing ! by contrast the whey protein has much better calcium / magnesium balance and i buy a 5 pound tub every month. our friend @OperationEunice thinks whey is a byproduct of cheese making - yes when it comes to money and taste. but when it comes to nutrition it is cheese that is the byproduct of whey protein making. people like @Mike Dilger when they buy cheese are subsidizing my whey protein. whey protein has a pretty good price / performance ratio because cheese is a drug ( casamorphins ) and there are more Cheese Junkies like @Mike Dilger who are after cheese than bodybuilders like me who are after whey protein. i hope it stays that way - my grocery bills don't need to get any higher than they already are.

Calcification of your arteries is a good thing. It stabilzes an atheroma making it safe. Without the calcification, atheromas put you at risk of a cardiac event or stroke or pulminary ebolism. The presence of calcified arteries proves you have had atheromas (generally only atheromas calcify). Low CAC scores in old people prove they are the kind of person who probably doesn't develop atheromas at all... .and high CAC scores in young people proves they are developing them very rapidly. However, high CAC scores in old people and low CAC scores in young people don't tell us much. With CAC you can't see how many risky non-calcified atheromas exist, only proof that there used to be some. I do think Americans are lead to consume too much Calcium, based on bad science around osteoperosis. Just get sunshine and exercise and don't worry about the calcium... either way.

Americans take calcium for everything - Calcium for bones, Calcium for Acid Reflux, Calcium added to Orange Juice etc ... and that is on top of Cheese flavored everything i didn't suggest avoiding Calcium - but merely to keep it in balance with Magensium as for your points about stabilizing plaque - you might be right - but it is really besides the point. the point is simply to consume the amount of calcium that nature intended - not more or less - and to balance it with magnesium intake. Magnesium is the center atom of Chlorophyll, which is a molecule similar to Hemoglobin except Hemoglobin has iron at the center. Calcium is found in things like chalk. We are supposed to be eating animals who are supposed to be eating grass, thus Chlorophyll and Magnesium ... We are not supposed to be eating chalk and yet that is what Americans are doing - they are basically stuffing themselves with chalk - while completely ignoring magnesium. frankly it is hard to look at mainstream medical advice and come to any conclusion other than they are deliberately trying to kill us.