Raw Milk Products

OccamsRazor04
So I have been looking at Raw Milk vs Pasteurized, and trying to reconcile some facts.

Apparently the CDC says you are 150 times more likely to get ill from Raw Milk. So curiously I looked up some facts.

Apparently 1% of Americans consume Raw Milk.

From 1998 to 2008 there were 1.3 million illnesses, and 10% of all deaths caused by food products attributed to dairy products.

Yet a CDC study was only able to link 1,571 cases, 202 hospitalizations, and 2 deaths to Raw Milk from 1996 2006.

I am trying to figure out how to reconcile these two studies. Please do not post me propaganda from either side. I am only looking for how these two studies are reconciled.

www.jsonline.com...

www.cdc.gov...

Not as propaganda, but as real life experience. I used to help my elderly aunts and uncles in Northern Mexico milk the dairy cows and goats as a child. When I went on vacation to visit them. I remember them giving me a cup full of fresh warm, milk and it was the best. When they were alive, they used the excess milk to make cheese. It was called Queso Fresco. It was stinky but tasted very good. The goat cheese was AWESOME, and if I still knew the process..I would be a millionaire! LOL!
Thank you for the nostalgia..I truly think we are losing the old ways. Oh, I almost forgot. I NEVER GOT ILL!!

Kratos

Kratos...

bonchoIf the CDC cherry picked, they did so by omitting recent years as raw milk consumption has increased to ~3% now. Whether or not they had recent data sets available to them would confirm that. Based on the data sets they are using, there are a couple other numbers that are concerning. The fact that there were more problems where raw milk was legal, rather than illegal, and that larger companies were circumventing rules to get more raw milk out there without adequate controls for the health of the animal (subsequently the milk).

This is the rebuttal.

Because the incidence of illness from dairy products is so low, the authors’ choice of the time period for the study affected the results significantly, yet their decision to stop the analysis with the year 2006 was not explained. The CDC’s data shows that there were significant outbreaks of foodborne illness linked to pasteurized dairy products the very next year, in 2007: 135 people became ill from pasteurized cheese contaminated with e. coli, and three people died from pasteurized milk contaminated with listeria wwwn.cdc.gov/foodborneoutbreaks/Default.aspx

So why stop in 2006? In 2007 there was SIGNIFICANT pasteurized related outbreaks, this would have completely changed the entire outcome.

Then we have ...

In 1985, there were over 16,000 confirmed cases of Salmonella infection that were traced back to pasteurized milk from a single dairy. Surveys estimated that the actual number of people who became ill in that outbreak were over 168,000, “making this the largest outbreak of salmonellosis ever identified in the United States” at that time, according to an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

According to Fallon Morell “In the context of the very low numbers of illnesses attributed to dairy in general, the authors’ decision to cut the time frame short, as compared to the available CDC data, is troubling and adds to questions about the bias in this publication.”

Then we have outbreaks vs. actual illnesses. The only reason for using outbreaks is to obfuscate the truth. They use the fact Ray milk is 1% of consumption, and then link that to OUTBREAKS rather illnesses. This is why it's "voodoo" research.

Say smalltime farmer Joe has an outbreak. It's only 10 gallons and affects 10 people.

Then bigtime Complex Dave has an outbreak, it's 1,000 gallons and affects 1,000 people.

Using CDC methodology they are both ONE outbreak, with Joe only being 1% of the consumption with having the same number of outbreaks, so Joe is now 100x MORE LIKELY to cause illness. It's such shoddy work it is borderline insanity to use such methodology and then create nation wide guidelines on it.

According to Fallon Morell, the CDC’s authors continue to obscure their study by failing to document the actual information they are using. They rely on reports, many of which are preliminary. Of the references related to dairy outbreaks, five are from outbreaks in other countries, several did not involve any illness, seven are about cheese-related incidents, and of the forty-six outbreaks they count, only five describe any investigations.

Perhaps most troubling is the authors’ decision to focus on outbreaks rather than illnesses. An “outbreak” of foodborne illness can consist of two people with minor stomachaches to thousands of people with bloody diarrhea. In addressing the risk posed for individuals who consume a food, the logical data to examine is the number of illnesses, not the number of outbreaks.

The CDC even then has to flat out lie.

"The authors acknowledge that the number of foodborne illnesses from raw dairy products (as opposed to outbreaks) were not significantly different in states where raw milk is legal to sell compared with states where it is illegal to sell,” notes Judith McGeary of the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance. “In other words, had the authors looked at actual risk of illness, instead of the artificially defined “outbreaks,” there would have been no significant results to report.”

And they intentionally did not differentiate between LEGAL and ILLEGAL Raw milk products. They simply lumped all products together to intentionally create misinformation.

This does not end the list of flaws with the study, however. The link between the outbreaks and the legal status of raw dairy mixed an entire category of diverse products. Illnesses from suitcase style raw cheese or queso fresco were lumped together with illnesses attributed to fluid raw milk, a much less risky product. In the majority of states where the sale of raw fluid milk is allowed, the sale of queso fresco is still illegal. The authors had all of the data on which products were legal and which products allegedly caused the illnesses, yet chose not to use that data.

Then as you said the actual figure is close to 3% of dairy is Raw milk, and at the time of this CDC study that was known. Using 1% rather than 3% allowed them to artificially inflate the Raw milk risk by 300%.

Similarly, to create the claimed numbers for how much riskier raw dairy products are, the authors relied on old data on raw milk consumption rates, rather than using the CDC’s own food survey from 2006-2007. The newer data showed that about 3 percent of the population consumes raw milk—over nine million people--yet the authors chose instead to make conclusions based on the assumption that only 1 percent of the dairy products in the country are consumed raw.

www.westonaprice.org...

We all need calcium, but adult animals do not consume any milk. We're the only ones.

kiko83bg
We all need calcium, but adult animals do not consume any milk. We're the only ones.

Yes. The point is not whether or not milk is needed, nor whether Raw milk is even healthy or not. It's about whether the claims made by the CDC can be substantiated, especially in light of a much larger study that was done which seems to contradict the CDC.

reply to post by OccamsRazor04

This is the rebuttal.

Because the incidence of illness from dairy products is so low, the authors’ choice of the time period for the study affected the results significantly, yet their decision to stop the analysis with the year 2006 was not explained. The CDC’s data shows that there were significant outbreaks of foodborne illness linked to pasteurized dairy products the very next year, in 2007: 135 people became ill from pasteurized cheese contaminated with e. coli, and three people died from pasteurized milk contaminated with listeria wwwn.cdc.gov/foodborneoutbreaks/Default.aspx

Talk about cherry picking now. The simple fact that for 1 gallon of raw milk sold, there is 99 gallons (or current figures 3/97) of pasteurized sold, you have to inflate raw milk incidents by *100 to get any idea of how many incidents there would be if raw milk was consumed by everyone. (That's assuming we do not have exponential growth once unrealistic production is hit).

Your source of information is WAPF which believe meat and butter is good for you, but whole grains aren't, and soy apparently is deadly.

Bring in the alternative health woo…

If you don't believe me check their myths and facts page where they are quoting a dozen studies all 30-40 years old… www.westonaprice.org...

(Cancer Res 35:3513 1975)
(JAMA 1967 202:1119-1123; Am J Clin Nutr 1981 34:1552)
(Lab Invest 1968 18:498)
(Soybeans: Chemistry & Technology Vol 1 1972)

www.care2.com...

www.westonaprice.org...

Then we have…

In 1985, there were over 16,000 confirmed cases of Salmonella infection that were traced back to pasteurized milk from a single dairy. Surveys estimated that the actual number of people who became ill in that outbreak were over 168,000, “making this the largest outbreak of salmonellosis ever identified in the United States” at that time, according to an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

According to Fallon Morell “In the context of the very low numbers of illnesses attributed to dairy in general, the authors’ decision to cut the time frame short, as compared to the available CDC data, is troubling and adds to questions about the bias in this publication.”

Yes, you do have… in 1985.

30 years ago. And the poeople responsible received criminal charges, and millions were paid out in settlements. But unless you are comparing it overall to raw milk numbers, what's the point? If the goal here is to rail against legalities and legislation… then you just provided an example of precisely that with pasteurized milk. But WAPF is complaining about raw milk receiving the same treatment.

Then we have outbreaks vs. actual illnesses. The only reason for using outbreaks is to obfuscate the truth. They use the fact Ray milk is 1% of consumption, and then link that to OUTBREAKS rather illnesses. This is why it's "voodoo" research.

No it's not, it's dealing in percentages. Go back to the example of the diarrhoea pill I gave you. You can't get data that doesn't exist, you have to extrapolate numbers.

Say smalltime farmer Joe has an outbreak. It's only 10 gallons and affects 10 people.

Then bigtime Complex Dave has an outbreak, it's 1,000 gallons and affects 1,000 people.

Using CDC methodology they are both ONE outbreak, with Joe only being 1% of the consumption with having the same number of outbreaks, so Joe is now 100x MORE LIKELY to cause illness. It's such shoddy work it is borderline insanity to use such methodology and then create nation wide guidelines on it.

Yes, because big time complex Dave actually had 100,000 customers and smalltime Joe had only 1000. You keep omitting the total amount of milk consumed!

Take individual cases, 2800 pasteurized to 1500 raw milk.

If 3 million people are drinking pasteurized and only 30,000 are drinking raw milk, which one is more likely to get you sick? Which has a higher incidence of food borne illness??

And they intentionally did not differentiate between LEGAL and ILLEGAL Raw milk products. They simply lumped all products together to intentionally create misinformation.

They did, I read the study. They actually say the illegal milk was safer. Which implies letting an illegal market thrive would probably be safer than regulation that is abused. They also cited cases where larger producers were taking advantage of the legal status and not keeping the cows in a safe /clean environment for producing good raw milk.


I didn't get too much time to read this following link*, however I believe they are a better source for you for raw milk advocacy rather than WAPF. They are advocates, yet they dispel certain myths like raw milk cures cancer, and other woo.

This to me is a good indication of a less biased source.

Link is here.

As you mentioned you wanted to stay away from propaganda, I recommend adding WAPF into your list of people to stay away from. Because much of their information is beyond questionable.

reply to post by boncho


Take this graphic into account for a second:



Eliminate cheese and eliminate outbreaks (because WAPF and yourself are claiming that is bias) and you are left with 2,098 cases for pasteurized and 930 cases for raw milk.

If you are pro raw milk and you want to argue its safety, you might say, "See look, only half the cases of illness for milk!"

Nice.

But, since we don't want to cherry pick. We have to take into account

Total milk production in the United States in
2010 was estimated at 193 billion pounds, suggesting that
≈2.7 trillion pounds of milk were consumed during the 14
years from 1993 through 2006 (27). If 1% of dairy products
were consumed nonpasteurized, then during these 14
years, 73 outbreaks were caused by the 27 billion pounds
of nonpasteurized dairy products that were consumed and
48 by the 2,673 billion pounds of pasteurized products
that were consumed.

And yes, they calculated the number off of outbreaks, not individual cases. So instead we will.

34.4 raw
0.78 pasteurized

It still comes out as 44 times more likely for an illness to occur from raw milk vs. pasteurized milk (cheese omitted).

boncho
Talk about cherry picking now. The simple fact that for 1 gallon of raw milk sold, there is 99 gallons (or current figures 3/97) of pasteurized sold, you have to inflate raw milk incidents by *100 to get any idea of how many incidents there would be if raw milk was consumed by everyone. (That's assuming we do not have exponential growth once unrealistic production is hit).

I have already said that is one of the numerous reasons why the CDC study is meaningless and wrong. Did you not see where I did the math of how using incidences is part of the voodoo they used in the study? They extrapolate "incidences" into consumption, which are two completely different things and can NOT be extrapolated into each other.

Your source of information is WAPF which believe meat and butter is good for you, but whole grains aren't, and soy apparently is deadly.

Red Herring. We are talking about Raw milk and the CDC study. Can you show me where on this SPECIFIC study they are posting erroneous information?

Yes, you do have… in 1985.

30 years ago.

And we have the Raw milk from 1993, 22 years ago. So 30 years is too far, but 22 is perfect?

And the poeople responsible received criminal charges,[/url] and millions were paid out in settlements. But unless you are comparing it overall to raw milk numbers, what's the point? If the goal here is to rail against legalities and legislation… then you just provided an example of precisely that with pasteurized milk. But WAPF is complaining about raw milk receiving the same treatment.

I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. No one is talking legalities or legislation. No one is talking safe or unsafe. Raw milk could be worse than sewerage for all I care. I am talking the methodology used in the CDC study and why it appears a much larger study 100% contradicts the supposed risks the CDC says Raw milk has.

No it's not, it's dealing in percentages. Go back to the example of the diarrhoea pill I gave you. You can't get data that doesn't exist, you have to extrapolate numbers.

100% false. Can you imagine if all studies said we don't have the actual numbers so we will just make something up? Perhaps if they took incidences and looked at the number of gallons in each incidence to try to get numbers than can be compared it would be more meaningful. You 100% can NOT simply extrapolate things, that is a cardinal sin in research.

Yes, because big time complex Dave actually had 100,000 customers and smalltime Joe had only 1000. You keep omitting the total amount of milk consumed!

Take individual cases, 2800 pasteurized to 1500 raw milk.

If 3 million people are drinking pasteurized and only 30,000 are drinking raw milk, which one is more likely to get you sick? Which has a higher incidence of food borne illness??

EXACTLY. Dealing with ACTUAL ILLNESSES would avoid the problem. They intentionally AVOID doing that. I keep using 100% sound math that PROVES my position, and you write meaningless numbers that are not connected.

Here is an example.

Drink A has a 50% market share.
Drink B has a 50% market share.

Drink A has 10 huge megaplants each bottling 10 million bottles.
Drink B has 100 plants each bottling 1 million bottles.

Drink A has 1 plant with an "outbreak", and 10 million bottles are affected.
Drink B has 4 plants with an "outbreak" and 4 million bottles are affected.

The CDC methodology states that drink B is 4 times more likely to cause illness, even though drink A actually has 2.5 times more bottles affected.

They did, I read the study. They actually say the illegal milk was safer. Which implies letting an illegal market thrive would probably be safer than regulation that is abused. They also cited cases where larger producers were taking advantage of the legal status and not keeping the cows in a safe /clean environment for producing good raw milk.

Show me where they differentiate the figures and compare LEGAL and ILLEGAL Raw milk vs pasteurized milk. Quote the figures.

I didn't get too much time to read this following link*, however I believe they are a better source for you for raw milk advocacy rather than WAPF. They are advocates, yet they dispel certain myths like raw milk cures cancer, and other woo.

I am not a Raw milk advocate, nor do I plan on being one, nor do I care in the slightest. I do not drink milk and will never drink milk, in any form. I could not care less if Raw milk is worse than drinking vomit, I have no investment in Raw milk being safe or healthy. My sole purpose is seeing if there are indeed major flaws with the CDC study.

This to me is a good indication of a less biased source.

Link is here.

As you mentioned you wanted to stay away from propaganda, I recommend adding WAPF into your list of people to stay away from. Because much of their information is beyond questionable.

edit on 17-12-2013 by boncho because: (no reason given)

I only care about what they say about this one particular study. I haven't verified everything in that article, but some of it I have, and the things I did verify they were 100% right about. Their opinion on Raw milk or anything else is meaningless to me, only this one study.

I agree, the link you gave was better for a Raw milk standpoint, but I am not interested in Raw milk, only the CDC study and the flaws I believe it has.

OccamsRazor04

kiko83bg
We all need calcium, but adult animals do not consume any milk. We're the only ones.

Yes. The point is not whether or not milk is needed, nor whether Raw milk is even healthy or not. It's about whether the claims made by the CDC can be substantiated, especially in light of a much larger study that was done which seems to contradict the CDC.

I'm certain milk intolerance has something to do with sinusitis and allergic rhinitis.

reply to post by OccamsRazor04

I have already said that is one of the numerous reasons why the CDC study is meaningless and wrong. Did you not see where I did the math of how using incidences is part of the voodoo they used in the study? They extrapolate "incidences" into consumption, which are two completely different things and can NOT be extrapolated into each other.

That's like saying a control group doesn't count in a clinical study. If 2.7 trillion lbs of pasteurized dairy is produced over the time of the study and the incident rate is lower compared to the 27 billion lbs of raw dairy how is it voodoo to do simple division and see that more incidents occur when compared to the total amount of milk produced?

Red Herring. We are talking about Raw milk and the CDC study. Can you show me where on this SPECIFIC study they are posting erroneous information?

I did. But they are posting much more, they are bringing up a bunch of other non-relevant things into the argument.

And we have the Raw milk from 1993, 22 years ago. So 30 years is too far, but 22 is perfect?

Do you have all the numbers for 1985? I just see one example.

I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. No one is talking legalities or legislation. No one is talking safe or unsafe. Raw milk could be worse than sewerage for all I care. I am talking the methodology used in the CDC study and why it appears a much larger study 100% contradicts the supposed risks the CDC says Raw milk has.

WAPF is. I would have rather seen you quote the study itself and list your gripes.

100% false. Can you imagine if all studies said we don't have the actual numbers so we will just make something up?

Which part is being made up? The milk production data is collected no differently than the food borne illness data.

Perhaps if they took incidences and looked at the number of gallons in each incidence to try to get numbers than can be compared it would be more meaningful. You 100% can NOT simply extrapolate things, that is a cardinal sin in research.

Insert extrapolate with "calculate". You can calculate the incident rate per gallon of milk produced. Raw is still higher.

The CDC methodology states that drink B is 4 times more likely to cause illness, even though drink A actually has 2.5 times more bottles affected.

No they don't because raw and pasteurized do not have equal market share. You just completely proved my point by adding that into your calculation. Now skew the market share 99/1 and recalculate.

Show me where they differentiate the figures and compare LEGAL and ILLEGAL Raw milk vs pasteurized milk. Quote the figures.

From the OP study…

Of the 71 remaining
outbreaks involving nonpasteurized dairy products, 55
(77%) occurred in states where sale of nonpasteurized
dairy products produced in that state was legal. Among
these 71 outbreaks involving nonpasteurized dairy
products, 1,526 persons became ill and 1,112 (73%) of
these illnesses occurred in states where it was legal to
sell nonpasteurized dairy products. Also among these
71 outbreaks involving nonpasteurized dairy products,
15 occurred in states where sale of non pasteurized dairy
products was illegal. The source of the nonpasteurized
dairy products was reported for 9 of these outbreaks: 7
(78%) were associated with nonpasteurized dairy products
obtained directly from the producing dairy farm, 1 was
associated with nonpasteurized dairy products obtained
under a communal program to purchase shares in dairy
cows (i.e., cow shares, a scheme used to circumvent state
restrictions on commercial sales of nonpasteurized dairy
products)

Original report on incident

The facility that supplied milk to patients was a Grade A organic dairy farm with 36 dairy cows. The farm also had a retail store in which milk and other food products were available. In addition, farm operators provided unpasteurized milk samples at community events and to persons who toured the farm, including children from childcare facilities. Because unpasteurized milk cannot be sold legally to consumers in Wisconsin, the dairy distributed unpasteurized milk through a cow-leasing program. Customers paid an initial fee to lease part of a cow. Farm operators milked the cows and stored the milk from all leased cows together in a bulk tank. Either customers picked up milk at the farm or farm operators had it delivered. On December 8, investigators obtained a milk sample from the farm's bulk milk tank, and cultures of the milk samples grew C. jejuni with a PFGE pattern that matched the outbreak strain. Farm operators were ordered to divert all milk to a processor for pasteurization.

I agree, the link you gave was better for a Raw milk standpoint, but I am not interested in Raw milk, only the CDC study and the flaws I believe it has.

My apologies. When you began quoting the WAPF I was rather confused. In any case, review this post and let me know. I still don't understand how the total volume of milk produced is not relevant.

I should also clarify, incident rate is a calculation, policy determining the future of the industry and the effects of widespread practice, they are extrapolating the data. (I presume)

In other words, they can with the numbers confirm that there is a set % of people getting sick off less milk with the data set. No, they cannot see the future and determine that if production was at par, the future dataset would reflect the current one perfectly, but it is a good educated guess.

No different than other public health issues like washing hands before food preparation prevents (x) number of incidents *meals prepared vs times not washed.

reply to post by boncho


I will try to respond in a few hours i have to finish work.

i've been reading about raw milk to remineralize my teeth, but can't seem to get hold of any here, nowhere local and its costly, i would switch to it if i could get some. didn't the queen smuggle it in for wills n harry when they were at school while us mere mortals had to have the pasteurized stuff?

slippeddisc
i've been reading about raw milk to remineralize my teeth, but can't seem to get hold of any here, nowhere local and its costly, i would switch to it if i could get some. didn't the queen smuggle it in for wills n harry when they were at school while us mere mortals had to have the pasteurized stuff?

I do not think raw milk will remineralize your teeth.

My uncle Mark was a dairy farmer in kansas. His operation was rather large and had a milking barn with several levels. The smell was indescribible. Horrible doesn’t even touch it. He fed his cows silage and it wasn’t the most sanitary place you ever saw. I wouldn’t drink his milk raw (that would be suicidal!). For raw milk I recommend checking out your local smaller farms if possible. Visit them to see how they care for their bovine buddies! It helps to support the local economy and small farmers. They need it!

If you support corporate, factory farms, you will get what you pay for. Diseased, unhappy, chemical-laden cows that produce ..... poison.

Real milk comes from pastured, grass-fed cows that are treated humanely. Raw milk from conscientious producers is as good as it gets. Organic milk from conscientious is second best. You're gonna pay real money for quality products. Don't even think about "quality" in $2 a gallon milk. It's not even milk.