Clarity
For the most part I have stayed out of the controversy around whether people should or should not drink raw milk or eat raw milk cheeses; a difficult thing to do at times as I am both an urban farm enthusiast and a public health nurse. However, the evidence against any health benefits, aside from a general feeling of going against big government, and the increasing number of people getting sick has led me to join the fray on the side of the pasteurizers.
Pregnant women, young children, the elderly and immune compromised people can’t fight off germs as well as others can. The result is they are more vulnerable to getting sick. I used to run an obstetrics clinic and I remember well the woman from Mexico who miscarried after getting a case of Listeria from a raw milk cheese and I can still feel the clenching belly cramps from a case of Salmonella I experienced after drinking raw milk while in Mali.
A recent article in the New York Times highlights a report from the AAP that lays out the hazards:
In a new policy statement, the American Academy of Pediatrics has advised children, infants and pregnant women not to consume any raw milk or raw milk products from cows, goats or sheep.
Although the sale of unpasteurized milk products is legal in 30 states, the academy says that the evidence of the benefits of pasteurization to food safety is overwhelming, and that the benefits of any elements in raw milk that are inactivated by pasteurization have not been scientifically demonstrated.
The report, published Monday in Pediatrics, notes that many species of harmful bacteria have been found in unpasteurized milk products, including Listeria, Salmonella, Escherichia coli and Cryptosporidium, among others.
So what to do if you are dead set against pasteurized products? Having your own animals, using safe practices and regularly testing their milk is probably the best way to go. If that is not practical then knowing your farmer is second best and if it’s impossible to know where that raw milk is coming from and you are feeding vulnerable people I would go with an organic milk.
I don’t think we should swallow everything that the government tells us to do but having lived in countries without any health infrastructure and seeing the death and misfortune wrought by polio, Listeria and other preventable diseases I am dismayed by the wholesale rejection of practices like pasteurization and vaccination and hope that we can weigh the evidence and come to a reasoned and balanced approach.
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