Also with the skimmed milk, besides skimming away the vit D, they also strip away CLA (conjugated linoleic acid) which is in the fat part of the milk ironcally.  CLA is what helps fat to be transported to the muscle to burn up the fat instead of it sitting around.  So in eating low fat and skimmed fat foods and drinking the same where milk is found, you become deficient in the stuff and hence the reason why obesity is on the rise in most countries.  They say that in the US, because the cows are grain fed instead of being put out to pasture to graze on grass (which is where they derive the CLA I presume or the enzymes in grass help to produce CLA in cow’s)  that they are also deficient in CLA, which is then passed to the consumer who is also deficient.  Even when they drink whole milk.  

I guess there is a lot to be said for tampering with something in the food chain like that.  There is also less CLA in the beef product from cow’s also which is the other largely consumed food stuff to cause obesity.  So if you cut down the fat in your meat, your cutting down the CLA and also if they restrict the cows from getting CLA, you end up deficient too.  We don’t have grain fed livestock here.  Don’t know about the UK either.  Since reading that we have full fat milk here for the kids and I don’t worry about the fat content.  They also (much to my disgust) like to eat the fat on chicken and beef with their meat) and I used to stop them but I don’t now.  None of my kids are overweight as such so I presume that all those facts are true about the CLA.