Raw Milk- Do the Benefits Outweigh the Risks?
Raw milk has received a lot of attention by the news media over the last several years. Raw milk is unpasteurized milk, which is illegal in Canada and in most US states. People that drink raw milk do so for the richer flavor, and some argue that pasteurization destroys beneficial bacteria. Also, some studies have found that pasteurization reduces the amounts of Vitamins A and D, and E that are naturally found in milk. One study found that raw milk has a higher Vitamin E content, due to the higher percentage of fat contained in the milk.
About a quarter of a million Canadians drink unpasteurized milk. One farmer interviewed by CTV News (a major Canadian broadcaster) says the demand is high, and some customers travel more than 200 kilometers to buy raw milk from his farm.
In the United States, although raw milk is illegal for sale in 15 states, there is a certified system to sell raw milk in almost half of the country. Health Canada maintains that raw milk is too risky, since the bacteria in milk has been linked to diseases such as tuberculosis and salmonella.
References
Kaushik et al. (2001). Removal of fat from cow’s milk decreases the vitamin E contents of the resulting dairy products. Lipids; 36(1): 73-8.
Tyron, J (2002).Black Market for Raw Milk Growing in Canada. Available online from http://www.ctv.ca [Cited Aug 23, 2007].
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Frustrating
Personally, I find this incredibly frustrating that natural milk is "illegal". It seems ridiculous that we can't buy a food product in it's natural, unaltered state. Obviously, you don't want unpasteurized milk coming from large commercial dairy with hormone and antibiotic injected cows that may or may not have strains of antibiotic resistant bacteria in their environment, but even small farms that raise their cattle organically can't sell unpasteurized milk. I read this one story a while back about this farm that sold people their own cows, and "boarded" them for their owners that lived elsewhere. Then the owners would come and get natural milk from their cows, and even this practice was deemed "illegal". Personally, I don't drink very much milk anymore, and we don't feed any non-organic cow's milk to our daughter. I have read far too many horror stories regarding the antibiotics and hormones they inject into cattle and have seen some pretty unsavory feedlot conditions. I am not saying the entire industry is like that, but there are certainly some improvements that would need to be made before I started drinking very much milk again.
cow or goat?
are we talking about milk in general or cow's?
should we drink more cow or goat's milk? (if we should drink them at all)
edit: ah shoot!! superman beat me to it lol
Thank You.......
Great article,
For a person that is losing weight or just training for a sport, should they drink milk and or how much should they drink? Which milk is the best to drink???
Sean Forson ~ Aka "SUPERMAN"
Fit Trainer ~ Evolutions Fitness & Rehab Center
Tulare, Ca.