Raw Milk: Worth the Risk of E. Coli? Recent Cases

Raw milk can’t be sold in Michigan retail establishments, but it’s available through herd or cow-share programs. Among some, it’s touted as superfood loaded with nutrients and enzymes that boosts immunity and alleviates allergies, and is easier to digest than pasteurized milk.

But is it worth the risk?

Probably not, according to state health officials, who said Friday that two recent E. coli cases traced to raw milk or raw milk products have been reported in Oakland and Wayne Counties.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services and local health departments are advising residents against consuming products containing unpasteurized milk.

Under the herd and cow share programs, members own a part of a cow and receive raw milk in return. The programs aren’t inspected under Michigan dairy laws, and milk has not been treated to kill bacteria, as it is with pasteurized milk, which is heated briefly to kill any bacteria that might be present.

Because of that, raw milk poses “a potentially serious risk to human health,” Dr. Eden Wells, chief medical executive for the state health department, said in a news release.

Unpasteurized milk also can contain pathogens that cause a number of other serious diseases, such as hemolytic uremic syndrome, tuberculosis, listeriosis, campylobacteriosis, salmonellosis, brucellosis, and Q fever, Wells said.

However, groups like A Campaign for Real Milk say the government has gone nanny-state over the issue.

“Health officials are highly biased against raw milk and published reports reflect that bias,” the group says “Very often raw milk is blamed for an outbreak of illness without proof, or even for an outbreak that affected many people who did not consume raw milk.”

As an example, the group cited a 2001 outbreak of E. coli in Wisconsin that sickened many hundreds of people. A raw milk cow-share program was blamed, even though only a few of the hundreds of cow-share participants got sick.

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The Campaign for Real Milk says that milk that has been produced under sanitary and healthy conditions is a safe, healthy food.

The key is healthy cows that have tested free of tuberculosis and undulant fever, are free of infections, such as mastitis, and are on an appropriate diet of mostly grass, hay or silage and only a small amount of grain, if any.

“The milk should be full-fat milk, as many important anti-microbial and health-supporting components are in the fat,” the group said on its website. “The cows should be milked under sanitary conditions and the milk chilled down immediately.”

Image by Alisha Vargas via Flickr Commons