What are your personal thoughts on selling raw milk? Since,I have drank raw milk for seven years and never had a health scare,I think it should be sold.However,there should be strict sanitation guidelines and a warning on the bottles like they put on alcohol.
And could we maybe get something more substantive than anecdotal evidence? What risks are even involved in consuming un-Pasteurized milk? Why is there a movement to allow people to sell raw milk? Why raw instead of low heat Pasteurization? Etc.
I am fine with raw milk being sold as long as cows are pumped full of antibiotics to make up for the lack of pasteurization.
Drunk it in the past, drink pasteurised now. There is no difference in taste as far as I can tell, but scientifically one is safer than the other and I'd rather consume something thats got a reduced chance of making me ill
I'm always amazed by the expiration dates on organic milk. I guess they cook the hell out of it. Because it's organic. And then it lasts forever. But also tastes like ass.
*Disclaimer* The following is of an anecdotal nature since I am neither a scientist nor am I an expert in this particular field *Disclaimer* I've had raw milk and it tastes better than anything you can buy in a store imo. You just need to be careful to drink it all within 5 days and keep it cold and sealed as much as possible. Pasteurization is safer because you don't have to worry about getting sick, what the cow was eating, antibiotics, etc.
I've had milk still warm like pee directly out of the cow, and there's no denying that it does taste great. But this was in Austria from a family farm, a micro operation that had no more than a dozen cows. Alpine grass-fed cows. It's hard to imagine that some poor industrial dairy cow bloated with meds and fed god knows what is going to produce a milk that tastes anything like that.
I've tried raw milk, having grown up surrounded by dairy farms. However, I wouldn't recommend it in large quantities, or as the norm. Raw milk can be tainted with Listeria and other disease-causing bacteria, and I believe several resulting food poisoning outbreaks have been well documented. This is why pasteurization is a good thing.
My father grew up on a farm, drank milk that had recently been pumped out of the cow, drank buttermilk straight from the butter churn, and he's fine. He will not drink milk at all now, doesn't even put in coffee, and I don't know if that's because he thinks ultrapasteurized milk from the grocery store tastes like **** or if he just developed a distaste for milk otherwise. I'm not a milk drinker but I don't think I'd go raw even if I were. In addition to the need to be so careful about disease, the lack of homogenization is a turn off.
Never had any health problems because of raw milk. One of my relatives who owns a farm with about 100 cows told me it's perfectly ok to drink it.
I find this to be an odd spot for me.... on one hand, raw milk is linked with a greater incidence of disease. On the other, it effects people on a very limited level (in contrast to, say, not being vaccinated). I'd think if there were suitable limits, I'd be alright with the selling of it, but since there is a clear health risk, I think it would be something that I'd want treated roughly like, say, cigarettes. You can buy it, but it has warning labels and is not for children.
My former roommate, who was from Peru, drank raw milk most of her childhood. Her immune system today is extremely strong. Don't know if there's a correlation, but it is interesting. She also regularly eats ceviche (raw fish with lemon juice) with no digestive problems. The warning label should include "those with impaired immune systems should not drink this product."
Just because people have been doing things "for centuries" doesn't make them a good idea. There's a lot of things that our ancestors did that we now know to be a bad idea. No matter how long they did it. I'll keep my moo juice pasteurized, please.
