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redblack: No really. I don’t disagree that drinking raw milk has its hazards. People can and do get sick from it. But there are real, documented benefits, too.
In the 2010 Thanksgiving issue of the New Yorker, there’s a great piece about the modern probiotic food movement, and the article discusses raw milk at length. The whole article isn’t available online, but here’s an abstract:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/11/22/101122fa_fact_bilger
Some choice quotes from the article:
The immune system builds up fewer antibodies in a sterile environment; the deadliest pathogens can grow more resistant to antibiotics; and innocent bystanders such as peanuts or gluten are more likely to provoke allergic reactions. All of which may explain why a number of studies found that children raised on farms [many drinking raw milk, incidentally –D.P.] are less susceptible to allergies, asthma, and autoimmune diseases. The cleaner we are, it sometimes seems, the sicker we get.
Raw milk may be more susceptible to contamination than most foods (though it’s still ten times less likely to contain listeria than deli meat is). But just because it can’t be produced industrially doesn’t mean it can’t be produced safely, in smaller quantities. Wisconsin has some thirteen thousand dairies, about half of which, local experts estimate, are owned by farmers who drink their own raw milk. Yet relatively few people have been known to get sick from it.
Raw milk is rigorously tested in California and has to meet strict limits for bacterial count. The state’s standards hark back to the early days of pasteurization, when many doctors considered raw milk far more nutritious than pasteurized, and separate regulations insured its cleanliness. Dealing with live cultures [raw milk advocates] Katz and McAfee argue, forces dairies to do what all of agriculture should be doing anyway: downsize, localize, clean up production. “We need to go back a hundred and fifty years years, McAfee told me. “Going back is what’s going to help us go forward.”
–Very interesting piece. I’ll lend you the mag over a pasteurized beer, if you want to check it out.
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