Raw Milk: Dangerous Health Risk or Miracle Healing Food?

by Vanessa Barrington on April 30, 2008 in Sex

Is raw milk dangerous or does it offer health benefits?

Both sides have their proponents. Detractors say drinking raw milk is an unacceptable health risk linked to outbreaks of listeria and e-coli. Champions counter that raw milk produced in pristine dairies from cows fed on their natural diet, grass, is a food with many healthy properties. It’s also argued that pasteurization destroys most of milk’s natural nutrients, including lactase-producing bacteria. (Lactase is the substance that helps people digest lactose.) Many lactose-intolerant people find they can tolerate raw milk.

The truth, as usual, probably lies somewhere in the middle. Raw milk was standard until urban dairies began to feed cows distillery slop, which made them sick and caused deadly illnesses in people. Outbreaks of diseases may have been traced to raw milk recently, but they’ve also been traced to pasteurized dairy products, lettuce, and hamburgers.

I check the farmer’s practices before deciding. A dairy called Organic Pastures produces the raw milk I drink, which I’m lucky enough to be able to buy at the grocery store in my state of California. Raw milk sales are legal in about half of the states in the US, but not generally in stores. In fact, there’s a growing movement toward cow shares that allow people to buy the milk directly from the dairy, which is another way to support family farmers.

Would you go raw?

Further Reading:

Boston Globe Online
Time
Where to find raw milk near you!

Image: hans s

Sarah I
April 30th, 2008 at 10:57 AM

I think it’s important that raw milk be available (as well an unpasteurized almonds!) and that people have access to educated choices, as well as perhaps the phone number/email of the dairy it comes from, so they can do their own research if they wish.

We are adults and we can make our own choices and take our own risks. I’m not a milk drinker myself, but I’d look for raw if I could…knowing the risks, but also the benefits. That’s life!
DrGraceG
May 30th, 2009 at 6:00 AM

How can anything not processed and from cows not injected with antibiotics and hormones be harmful to us? Our parents and grandparents and even some of us grew up on raw milk… I will not suffer from alergies osteo arthritis and many other diseases like our children will in their mid and old age. Pasteurizeing and Homogenizeing and injecting our cows with chemicals does a havoc on our bodies. Please, Help save the farmer in USA from loosing their farms, drink raw milk and buy your dairy from your local farmer. Support http://www.farmtoconsumer.net
Daniel Goldman
December 22nd, 2010 at 6:33 PM

One comment a year huh? I’ve used raw milk in the past. I’ve never noticed any issues with it. I think more research should be done to see exactly what the risks are and the best ways to limit the risk. Though given how many cases of e-coli etc there have been lately in products that are supposed to be considered safe, I think it’s fine to use raw milk from a local source that has been throughly investigated.