If the lactose intolerance is common for the vast majority of people of non-European descent, then why is milk drinking so common in certain African and Asian cultures?

Question

A lot of pasotoralkst and hisforically pastoralist peoples like the Maasai, Mongolians, Tibetans have a prominent milk drinking culture that existed before European influence. How’d groups like these get by for so long if lactose intolerance is so universal.

In: 23

Answer 1

African and Asian ethnic groups who historically frequently drink unfermented milk have often the lactose tolerance mutation. It exists in small clusters in Africa and Asia.

Mongolian typically drank fermented milk though, so they didn’t need the mutation.

Drinking milk and using condensed milk in desserts got much more popular in some parts of Asia recently (East Asia in particular), most of them don’t have the mutation since it needs to be selected for by having people who don’t have it die, which only happens for communities that depend on milk during times of famine. They usually either live with it (the effects of lactose intolerance are mild for most people) or take lactase pill or lactose-free milk.