Personally, growing up with first generation Chinese immigrants did not give me many chances to drink milk. Milk was not heavily integrated into their diets like many schools in United States; I remember a pint of milk costed less than bottled water in my school cafeterias. My interest in the topic sparked because of my parent's constant tabloid-like storytelling about the dangers of "western" food. Their concerns reached even a seemingly innocent food: milk. They  believed milk caused allergies and hatched diseases in the Western world that are non-existent in their Eastern homeland. Their opinions usually stemmed from clickbait articles on WeChat, a Chinese yahoo/Facebook app of sorts. Of course, there was truly no scientific basis to their thinking. Nevertheless, their rumor-like horror stories sparked my interest in the research of milk consumption and correlation to diseases. I browsed articles about milk and its effects on osteoporosis to anemia. Although there were no lack of topics or unsettled negative opinions about milk, I finally settled on a topic that I found more personally relevant than others. I chose to research milk consumption and its correlation to causing type-1 diabetes. Personally speaking, my grandmother was diagnosed with Type-2  diabetes in her senior years as a result of her unhealthy diet. She moved to the United Staes two decades ago, and having never been a good cook, the ease and convenience of buying fatty restaurant and process foods proved to be a cheap and sustainable source of nutrients.. Her consumption of milk-based products, like ice cream and yogurt, and animal fats increased exponentially. Unfortunately, her diet eventually paved the way for susceptibility  to illness and disease that were little to nonexistent in her homeland. Although my topic concerns type-1 diabetic individuals, the genetic predisposition for diabetes in diagnosed type-1 diabetes comes from parents who have diabetes themselves. If the parents had no genetic predisposition themselves, like my grandmother, it would mean their diet and lifestyle choices caused a chain reaction that increased their progeny's risk of developing the disease. Onset can begin even before the child is born. If an individual's  genotype expresses diabetic inclination, they will never be able to eat foods that their fellow peers enjoy. Milk is only one of the foods that can possibly increase the risks of diabetes. Because milk is so commonplace, its damage can be widespread if there is a possibility that its consumption is a risk factor, and should be eliminated from the diets of individuals at risk of type-1 diabetes.

In a few of my articles, a positive correlation between consuming animal fats and the occurrence of type-1 diabetes was found in countries with more access to meat and dairy products. The article I found was "Nutritional  Factors and Worldwide  Incidences of Childhood Type-1 Diabetes"  by Sandro Muntoni and his fellow co-authors. Muntoni gathers census-type data on different diets of countries and views each respective population as a whole. He points out a strong positive correlation between eating animal fats and occurrence of type-1 diabetes. Countries with higher GDP tend to have higher incidences  because wealthier nations, like the United States and some European countries, have access to richer foods in recent history. These rich foods, like butter and milk-based dishes and meat, possibly contribute to a higher number of cases. Although unproven, Muntoni speculates access to these foods increasing  after World War II may be the reason why diabetic cases have grown during those years. Countries with lower GDP cannot afford expensive foods. Diet in those countries are composed of vegetal matter, and likewise have an inverse relationship with the consumption of plant matter and occurrence of type-1 diabetes. Muntoni observes that individuals who choose to live a vegetarian lifestyle are not as susceptible to diseases. He also takes data from a case-control study of children with genetically diabetic inclination versus ones who do not and find out animal proteins, such as beef and chicken, are targeting and eliciting responses in the body that make insulin. Overproduction of insulin causes an autoimmune response in the body that will attack the pancreas beta-cells and cause the body to shut down its ability to process sugar. Muntoni uses solid scientific evidence to prove his argument for dietary consumption of animal proteins and its positive correlation with the occurrence of type-1 diabetes. 

The protein insulin in milk plays a big part activating type-1 diabetes in children already at risk . Another article, "Confirmed Anew: Cow's Milk may Trigger Type-1 Diabetes", by Sayer Ji plays on the some of the same points as Muntoni. His article is much shorter and follows a blog-type format and uses a study testing cow's milk formula against whey-based formula on infants with genetic susceptibility. The study tested a cow's milk formula without insulin as well and was able to isolate it as the main causative agent. Like Muntoni, Ji concludes that the consumption of milk leads to overproduction of insulin, and causes the body to produce autoantibodies that attack pancreas beta cells. Though both articles do touch on similar points, Muntoni's article is constructed more thoroughly and his background as a Doctor in Medicine and president of Metabolic Diseases and Complications Association gives him credibility to write his scientific research article. He uses solid scientific evidence in his paper to prevent bias, and mentions in his paper that his census-type data is only representative of countries as a whole and unfortunately cannot do a case-by case study on specific individuals.. Sayer Ji is on the Board of Governors for The National Health Foundation and a reviewer at the International Journal of Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine, so his background gives him credibility to write and review scientific studies on the effects of milk and type-1 diabetes. His article, "Confirmed Anew: Cow's Milk may Trigger Type-1 Diabetes", does have a more clickbait-ish title than Muntoni's, but the article is intended to be reached by a wider audience. Ji still supports his arguments with solid scientific basis, though he only uses one study as evidence opposed to Muntoni's mass data sources. What Ji lacks in information volume is made up for his simple, layman's terms that is easily digested by a wide audience. 

While Muntoni and Ji support my argument, I found another article, "Milk: Can a Good Food be so Bad?", by Jeanne Goldberg that rebutted my views on the premise of inadequate data. Goldberg is the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, and  earned her PhD there. She works on nutrition based programs for elementary-school students, especially ones concerning obesity. Her article is mostly a reaction to radical anti-milk campaigns. She uses different studies to debunk myths about milk's negative effects on lactose intolerance and type-1 diabetes. Goldberg pulls up a study conducted on October 2001 that tested milk against soy and wheat formula on infants. The study yielded results that, while did show higher development of type-1 diabetes in affected children, was not enough proof to conclude that milk is a high risk factor. Only 5% of children at risk from familial causes actually developed type-1 diabetes. Goldberg concludes that the study has insufficient data to support milk a causative agent. The author tries to eliminate bias by using scientific studies, but it is evident she is supportive of the positive health benefits of milk, and therefore would not want any data supporting the opposite. 

Though most articles I found on this topic supports my argument, I did find a few that opposed milk's contribution to type-1 diabetes. My initial position supports milk as a high risk factor for already genetically predisposed individuals for type-1 diabetes, and the articles that I researched have not changed my views. My rebuttal is now stronger because I found an opposing article, but can still be countered by evidence from other articles that supports my argument. Evidence from my first two articles uses scientific studies with controlled experiments that show positive correlation between feeding infants with cow's milk formula and raised incidences of type-1 diabetes diagnosis. Even the opposition article suggested positive correlation, but was brushed off because the author claimed it was not enough evidence and was biased by difference of the newborns' diets before they were placed into study groups. Unfortunately, my audience window is pretty small; the paper mainly concerns only type-1 diabetic individuals. I was still able to find articles vying for both sides of my research question, so I feel my topic is strong enough to base a paper around.

