Don Maxwell wrote:
>I am not aware of research into whether it's the 
lactose per se or the galactose formed from it that
causes problems for lactose intolerant individuals.  
Maybe that's a source of some of the baffling 
contradictions that seem to haunt the subject of LI.<

It's the lactose, Don. There are literally hundreds of 
articles in the medical literature on this over the last 
forty years. One session on MEDLINE will lead you to 
as many of them as needed. Galactose bothers no one 
except for the extremely tiny percentage of people with 
galactosemia - and they already know who they are, I 
assure you. For the rest of us galactose is converted to 
glucose within 45 minutes.

 And which LI contradictions are you referring to?

>The bottom line is, casein may contain a low level 
of lactose, depending on degree of purification.  
Highly purified sodium caseinate will have
very low levels, less than 1%.<

The highest reported level I have ever seen for 
lactose in casein is 2%, but that was an isolated 
report. There is no reason to believe that most 
commercially processed casein has anywhere 
near that amount. And sodium caseinate will have 
proportionally much less than that, effectively zero 
for anyone with LI.

Steve Carper
author of Milk Is Not for Every Body: Living with LI

Steve Carper's Lactose Intolerance Clearinghouse
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/stevecarper