The Risks of Raw Milk
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This week, as New Jersey state senators ponder proposed legislation that would legalize the sale of raw milk, California food safety officials are recalling and quarantining Organic Pastures raw milk products after five children who drank raw milk from the dairy contracted E. coli infections. Three of the children were hospitalized with hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), a serious complication of E. coli infections that can damage the kidneys and central nervous system and cause kidney failure, seizures, coma, and stroke.
Raw milk is milk that hasn’t been pasteurized. Proponents say drinking it can aid digestion, boost the immune system and ease the symptoms of allergies and asthma. There is no scientific evidence to back these claims. There is, however, a mountain of evidence that consuming raw milk can be dangerous and that pasteurization saves lives.
Raw milk is responsible for one of the deadliest outbreaks of foodborne illness in U.S. history, the 1911 streptococcus outbreak that killed 48 people and sickened more than 2,000,according to Preventative Medicine and Hygiene, by Milton Joseph Rosenau.
Raw milk products account for the bulk of all dairy product-associated outbreaks of foodborne illness reported to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Over the 36-year period between 1973 and 2009, a whopping 82 percent were caused by raw milk or cheese made from raw milk. Raw milk and raw milk products caused 93 reported outbreaks of foodborne illness between 1998 and 2009, according to the CDC. Those outbreaks sickened 1,837 people, 195 of whom required hospitalization, two of whom died.
“It is important to note that a substantial proportion of the raw milk-associated disease burden falls on children; among the 93 raw dairy product outbreaks from 1998 to 2009, 79% involved at least one person less than 20 years old.”
Most illnesses associated with the consumption of raw milk are caused by E. coli: O157, Campylobacter, or Salmonella, all of which can create serious, sometimes fatal infections. For all foodborne illnesses, children are among those considered most at risk.
The United States has been aware of the dangers of raw milk since the turn of the last century when the diseases it spread included: tuberculosis, typhoid fever, diptheria, scarlet fever, septic sore throat, malta fever and foot and mouth disease, according to Preventative Medicine and Hygiene. Between 1907 and 1911, raw milk caused five outbreaks that sickened more than 4000 people in the Boston area alone, according to Rosenau’s research. In Washington, during the same time period, 10 percent of all typhoid fever cases were traced to raw milk.
Those outbreaks were the impetus for improving the safety of milk through pasteurization. Pasteurization began in the 1920s and was widespread by 1950, according to the CDC:
“It led to dramatic reductions in the number of people getting sick from diseases that had previously been transmitted commonly by milk. Most public health professionals and health care providers consider pasteurization to be one of public health’s most effective food safety interventions ever!”
Many medical and scientific organizations recommend that consumers drink only pasteurized milk. They include: the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Veterinary Medical Association, the National Association of State Public Health Veterinarians, and others.
Sources: Preventative Medicine and Hygiene, by Milton Joseph Rosenau.
