Lactose Intolerance in Healthy Children

MILK and lactose intolerance are usually not suspected in children if they were able to tolerate milk during infancy. Nevertheless, it seemed worthwhile to investigate lactose tolerance in healthy children for a number of reasons: milk-induced abdominal cramps and diarrhea have been found in approximately 10 per cent of adults1 2 3; these adults usually did not have symptoms as children and noted the onset soon after adolescence or in the third decade; many consumed large amounts of milk as children; and 70 per cent of a group of 20 healthy Negro adults had low lactase levels, in contrast to only . . .