Research race alarms diabetes experts

By FIONA BARBER

Research on tens of thousands of children and a safety pilot study are needed to test whether phasing out milk with a suspect protein reduces diabetes, say experts on the disease.

A Dunedin-based company, A2 Corporation, has now joined the research race implicating a protein in cows' milk in the onset of insulin-dependent diabetes and heart disease.

The company's commercial venture follows controversial Auckland research by Professor Bob Elliott in 1997 which pointed to the connection.

Professor Elliott suggested a link between the A1 protein and the onset of insulin-dependent (type-one) diabetes in children prone to the disease. He called for cows with the A1 protein - 75 to 80 per cent of New Zealand's national herd - to be phased out and for numbers of those with the A2 protein to be boosted.

Yesterday, two experts emphasised the necessity of pilot schemes to gauge the A2 protein's safety. Then, if the milk were proven safe, large-scale studies needed to be done.

Dr Wayne Cutfield, director of endocrinology at the Starship children's hospital and a senior lecturer at Auckland Medical School, said research over five to 10 years with a large number of subjects - "in excess of tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands"- was needed to demonstrate any potential benefit.

But first it was important to know if there were other risks associated with the A2 milk.

"What if they've got twice the incidence of asthma or some other disease?"

Another way to evaluate the theory would be to study children who had a parent or sibling with type-one diabetes.

Dr Jinny Willis, a scientist from Christchurch Hospital's lipid and diabetes research group, said type-one diabetes was increasing worldwide and the cows' milk hypothesis had been simmering for some time.

Professor Elliott, she said, had some excellent ideas, but pilot trials and a major study were needed first.

Also, changes should not be made to milk supply without pilot schemes.

"Particularly with children, you need to look at the ethics: will it have developmental consequences?"

Professor Elliott, formerly of the Auckland Medical School but now involved with the private research firm Diatranz, said yesterday that people had been drinking A2 milk for a long time and there had been no problem with it.

He said the call for A2 milk was gathering momentum, and he predicted that New Zealanders would be drinking A2 milk within five years.

"It's virtually unstoppable now."

The Dairy Board, which collaborated with Professor Elliott in his research, vowed in 1997 to increase stocks of the A2 milk for people who were susceptibleto insulin-dependent diabetes.

Yesterday, board spokesman Neville Martin said research was continuing through the Dairy Research Institute and other agencies, which he would not name. The board had, however, talked to A2 Corporation.

Mr Martin said that in the wake of Professor Elliott's research the board took advice on whether to go ahead with production.

That advice stated that there was still not enough evidence to make any claims for the milk, and therefore production was not an option commercially.