Do Casomorphins from Cow’s Milk Contribute to Autism?

Michael Greger M.D. FACLM wrote in his NutritionFacts.org blog that Casomorphins—breakdown products of casein, a milk protein, with opiate-like activity—may help explain why autism symptoms sometimes improve with a dairy-free diet.

In my last video series on autism and diet, I talked about the benefits of broccoli sprouts, but the most commonly studied nutritional and dietary interventions for autism and diet involve variations of gluten-free and casein-free diets. Why?

In the 1980s, a team of respected Norwegian researchers reported a peculiar finding. They were comparing the urine of children with and without autism in the hopes of teasing out any differences that could lead to hints to the cause of autism. As you can see at 0:42 in my video Autism and Casein from Cow’s Milk, a urine profile shows spikes for each of the various components. Normally, the urine’s peptides region is pretty quiet. Peptides are like small pieces of proteins, and, normally, we shouldn’t be peeing out much protein. But, in the urine profiles from children with autism, there were all sorts of peptide spikes.

This difference raised a question: “Can the pathophysiology”—that is, the dysfunction—“of autism be explained by the nature of the discovered urine peptides?” But, first: “Where do the peptides come from?” They didn’t know, but there was a clue: Most of the parents of kids with autism reported that their children’s disorder got worse when they were exposed to cow’s milk. In fact, two proteins—gluten, a protein in wheat, and casein, a protein in milk—break down not only into peptides but also into exorphins.

Exorphins, opioid peptides derived from food proteins, “are called exorphins because of their exogenous [that is, from outside of the body] origin and morphine-like activity,” as opposed to endorphins, which are morphine-like compounds we produce inside our bodies. Perhaps some of these food peptides represent a new class of hormones?

Well, is that what the kids were peeing out? Apparently so, as some of those peptides had opioid activity. Maybe the researchers were on to something. 

To read the entire article, click here.