Pro

Raw Milk Facts, a website advocating raw milk consumption, wrote in an article titled "The Health Benefits of Raw Milk" (accessed May 31, 2017):

“Clean raw milk from pastured cows is a complete and properly balanced food… About 80% of the proteins in milk are caseins – reasonably heat stable but easy to digest. The remaining 20% or so fall into the class of whey proteins, many of which have important physiological effects (bioactivity). Also easy to digest, but very heat sensitive, these include key enzymes (specialized proteins) and enzyme inhibitors, immunoglobulins (antibodies), metal-binding proteins, vitamin binding proteins and several growth factors… Studies have shown significant loss of these important disease fighters when milk is heated to normal processing temperatures…

Lactose, or milk sugar, is the primary carbohydrate in cow’s milk. Made from one molecule each of the simple sugars glucose and galactose, it’s known as a disaccharide. People with lactose intolerance for one reason or another (age, genetics, etc.), no longer make the enzyme lactase and so can’t digest milk sugar. This leads to some unsavory symptoms, which, needless to say, the victims find rather unpleasant at best. Raw milk, with its lactose-digesting Lactobacilli bacteria intact, may allow people who traditionally have avoided milk to give it another try.”

May 31, 2017