The new California dairy standards, including the coliform bacteria limits, were signed into law October 8, yet it wasn’t until yesterday, three weeks after the fact, that the California Department of Food and Agriculture got around to putting out a press release about it.
Interesting coincidence that this release wasn’t issued until the day the media, including a number of blogs, come out with stories about the new standards. What is especially intriguing about the release, though, is this statement: “Routine farm inspection samples of bulk milk collected during the last year show the two {California raw milk} dairies would have met the new coliform standards 75 percent of the time.”
My first reaction was to think that maybe the situation isn’t as bad as Mark McAfee is making it out to be. I suspect that in saying that three-fourths of his milk won’t pass the standard, Mark has made the situation more dire than it really is, to help him make a stronger case. The CDFA is almost certainly doing the same thing at the other end. If you put the two estimates together, "only" half of raw milk in California won’t meet the standard…maybe it won’t be so bad…
Then I realized that this is exactly how the authorities want us to think. They set arbitrary standards (instead of realistic standards that will also ensure safety), and get everyone absorbed into whether the dairies can meet them—if only they apply some extra ammonia and Mr. Clean, it will all be okay.
But in thinking their way, we overlook the larger messages the regulators are communicating to us and to anyone producing raw milk, or thinking about producing raw milk:
* As Kirsten states in a comment on my previous post, “the powers that be continue to harass raw-milk producers for endpoints that have no bearing on the safety of the product.” In other words, the regulators want to intimidate every dairy farmer who is producing raw milk, or thinking about selling raw milk or setting up a cowshare, and use Organic Pastures as the example. They want dairy farmers to think to themselves: “I don’t have anywhere near the resources of Organic Pastures. How can I possibly fight these people?”
* I now understand that our government and its agri-business moneybag supporters are deadly serious about getting rid of raw milk, and that all the other instances of harassment are definitely not isolated incidents. To their way of thinking, this has already gone much further than they would like. I’m sure the factory-farm dairy lobbyists have conveyed the message to the FDA, CDFA, and the others: stop this foolishness NOW!
* These are sinister, sinister people we are dealing with here—the bureaucrats, the legislators, and the moneybags supporting them. To sneak through legislation like the coliform standard, and then talk about protecting the public…most of them could care less about the public, except that they want their budgets and political contributions, and to continue those, they must keep the agri-business lobby happy. If they cared about the public, why would they deny people the right to consume one of nature’s oldest products?
* The FDA and USDA really run things here. These state agriculture departments may act as if they’re independent, but they take their “advice,” really, their orders, from Washington. And Washington (i.e. the corporate interests) doesn’t like to see millions of people bypassing Wal-Mart, Publix, and Krogers to buy food at farmers markets and via herdshares. Next thing you know, people may cut back on their Cokes and corn chips, and question whether they really need that statin.
* This is a long-term battle. We’ve lost apple cider and almonds; we’re going to have to earn our right to keep drinking raw milk, as well as keep access to other nutritious whole foods.
* I realize how vulnerable my/our raw milk supplies really are. In my case, I rely on two farms for raw milk—one in New Hampshire and one in Massachusetts. Both are small subsistence operations, with nowhere near the financial resources of Organic Pastures. Either one could be wiped out very quickly by the kind of government mandate we’ve seen passed in California. Since other farms are similarly fragile financially, I presume such a situation extends to most of the country.
On the encouraging side, the blogosphere has been abuzz about the California situation. My main hope is that the regulators and legislators underestimated the outrage people feel, because that is really the only hope of correcting this situation, and sending a message so strongly convincing that they won’t be tempted to do it again. (To Maggie’s question about the meeting Mark McAfee is having Monday in Sacramento, attendance is limited; he had wanted an auditorium that would seat 250, but the authorities are allowing him to bring along only four people.)
History is full of examples of revolutions having been started over people not having access to bread. Why not one over milk?
Wow, only 4 people! Do you think they smell something is about to happen?
The whole almond issue is so upsetting to so many people (how did it happen??) that they will fight this tooth and nail.
They are selling raw orange juice at Trader Joes. It won’t be long before that is being pulled I am sure.
Anyway, thanks for your blog!!
The control certain entities are trying to exert over our ability to make our own decisions about food will soon be matched only by the most totalitarian of regimes. I hope more people begin to realize how ridiculous it is that (for the most part) you can’t legally buy milk from your neighbor’s cow because the gov’t (backed by food industry) says it’s dangerous. Truly, the founders of this nation would not recognize what it has become.
I examined and compared both documents. They both agree that 18 cases were identified and eight cases were confirmed; meaning that 18 children/adults became ill, but in only 8 of the 18 were they able to isolate and identify the pathogen (Ecoli 0157:H7) in the BM samples.
In the end, Sallys analysis was that some mysterious person parked across the street from the farm contaminated the milk. It didnt come from the Dee Creek cows. We see what we want to see. Its called denial. If ecoli 0157:H7 was found in e Dee Creek farms milk or in OPDC milk it would be evidence that would go against everything that the Weston Price Foundation and Sally Fallon believe about raw milk. The foundation of their belief system about the safety of raw milk would be challenged to the core–grass fed cows can harbor e-coli )157:H7 in their intestines.
Ive learned from personal experience that Sally Fallon takes a pro raw milk stance. If someone gives her information that supports the belief that raw milk is safe and that the establishment is out to get them, she will make an argument in that direction. She is not an unbiased figure when it comes to raw milk.
She has false facts about my son and the child of another parent on her realmilk website. Ive written the webmaster and asked this person to forward a letter to Sally stating my concerns. This was about a month ago. Ive never heard back from anyone. The false information about my child is still posted.
So Ive learned from personal experience, you cant believe everything Sally Fallon states on her website.
I am sorry this has happened to you. This should be corrected.I can contact Sally directly if you wish. She has always responded promptly in the past.
About Dee Creek, all I know is that what Sally here writes comes from the people involved and has been confirmed by Chrys Ostrander. Mark McAfee has also been involved in this case. His integrity is without doubt.
I know Sally is biased, but I also think she knows very well that raw food can make you sick just as non raw food can. Any food can contain e-coli. That raw milk can never be contaminated is really not the point of her agenda. Her agenda is that raw milk is health giving and pasteurization detrimental to real food.
I believe that making raw milk illegal across the States is the agenda of our authorities. And I do not trust their integrity nor their methods. I think Sally can take a contamination for what it is if it is the truth, and not feel her cause is lost. And it is not her cause alone. There are numerous other people supporting the very things she believes in as well. I would not stop believing in raw milk because of a contamination.
Anyway, let me know if you would like me to contact her and ask her to correct the information. I would gladly do so.
maria.
Dear Sally,
My name is Mary McGonigle-Martin. My son is one of the two children who became severely ill after drinking OPDC raw skim milk on Labor Day weekend, 2006. I have recently discovered that Mark McAfee is stating incorrect information about my child and his journey with E-coli 0157:H7 and HUS. I support the right for people to drink raw milk, but I dont appreciate facts about my child being misrepresented in order to support a pro raw milk spin on this website. You are a highly respected woman and if you make statements, give facts about an issue, people will believe it. I dont believe you intentionally misrepresented facts; you believed what Mark McAfee told you to be true.
Regardless of the source of contamination, my son and our family deserves the respect of correct facts being presented. My son has been through hell, and I would appreciate it if you could amend the underlined statements below or delete this page from your website all together.
http://www.realmilk.com/update-ca.html
Oct 23 2006
Comprehensive testing pointed to other sources for the illnesses. From the CDFA and media reports it would appear that OPDC had critically injured four kids. This is not true at all. Only two children were hospitalized and they have fully recovered. These two childrens parents freely admit that other sources of food contamination were probably the source of illness including spinach and sushi. The truth was never told in the media or by CDFA. These government agencies have an agenda that goes far beyond food safety. They hate raw milk and want it gone from California.
Correct Facts:
1. On October 23, 2006, Chris was still in the hospital at Kaiser Fontana. He was being weaned off seizure medication, and still had a PIC (peripherally inserted central catheter) line in his left arm feeding him intravenously. Chris hadnt eaten since September 7th. At this time, his pancreas still wasnt working. We left the hospital on November 2, 2006. Chris spent a total of two months in the hospital.
2. At this time, the other child was at home, but not fully recovered. She has never fully recovered. Until a few months ago, she was still on blood pressure medication and is currently taking medications to help her kidneys function properly.
3. When Mark came to the hospital to visit during the 3rd week of September, I thought the spinach and raw milk were in the process of being tested, therefore assumed we would have the answer shortly as to what food was contaminated with e-coli 0157:H7. I never told Mark I thought the spinach was the source of the illness (how would I know if it was the spinach or the milk). I did tell him I hoped the spinach was contaminated and not the milk. Unfortunately, the food products were never tested because the e-coli bacteria were never isolated in Chris.
4. Chris did eat spinach in the same timeframe that he drank the recalled milk. However, Chris did not eat packaged Dole spinach that was implicated in the E-coli outbreak. He ate spinach from an open bin at our local health food store.
5. I have no idea if the other child ate sushi, but regardless if she did or didnt, it has no bearing on this issue. Sushi is raw fish, not raw cow. Sushi can be contaminated with many pathogens, but E-coli 0157:H7 is not one of them. The FDA created a Safe Food Chart for Meat, Poultry, and Seafood that lists human pathogen associations.
Campylobacter jejuni
(beef and poultry)
Clostridium botulinum
(seafood)
Clostridium perfringens
(meat)
Escherichia coli O157:H7
(ground beef and pork)
Listeria monocytogenes
(pork, poultry, and seafood)
Norwalk Virus
(seafood)
Salmonella
(beef, pork, poultry, and seafood)
Staphylococcus aureus
(beef, pork, and poultry)
Vibrio cholerae
(seafood)
Vibrio vulnificus and other vibrios
(seafood)
Yersinia enterocolitica
(meat and seafood)
Is it safe to eat sushi, the Japanese raw fish specialty?
People in the at-risk groups should not eat raw or undercooked fish or shellfish. People with liver disorders or weakened immune systems are especially at risk for getting sick. Foods made with raw fish are more likely to contain parasites or Vibrio species than foods made from cooked fish. Always cook finfish until its muscle is opaque and flaky.
Mark McAfee also stated false information about our children in four other venues. Three are written and one is from a radio show. The Kojo Nnamdi show aired on August 13th 2007. You were a guest on this show and Mark McAfee called in and made the following statements. You have not written any information using these facts, but you heard them, therefore I feel the need to state the correct facts.
(Mark) There were not four children that were sickened, there were only 2 children that were sickened. Two of these children were never treated with any antibiotics, were never treated with any medications, recovered at home, without therapy, without being in the hospital and their parents denied that they were very ill or they were ill at all.the other two children were very, very sick.
(Correct Facts: If the other two children werent ill, why were they taken to the doctors? All four of the children were ill with severe diarrhea thats why they were tested for E-coli 0157:H7. Doctors would only use this test if a child was presenting symptoms. All 4 of the children were ill with diarrhea, 3 of the 4 children tested positive for e-coli 0157:H7, but only 2 of the 4 children developed Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome (HUS))
(Mark) The tragedy of it all is this when I asked the parents and asked the doctors and looked at the records at Loma Linda, they did not have pathogens in their stools that matched each other. In other words, it was a different bacteria that made the 2 children sick. One had e-coli 0157:H7 and the parent/caretaker of the child said it had nothing to do with raw milk. It was a spinach salad and they never assumed it was raw milk. And the other child, it was not e-coli 0157:H7, it was Shigella. So when I had this information and I told the state that I found this information and I told them I was going to go to the national press with it; that you did not have four children sickened with the same pathogen, they gave me back my permit within a couple of days.
Correct Facts:
1. HIPPA laws prevent confidential information to be shared. The doctors are only there in the morning when they do their rounds and all the medical records are computerized. The hospital did not allow Mark to look at the medial records.
2. Now the switch in information occurs about what the other child at ate. Now she ate a spinach salad instead of saying she ate sushi. Chris is the one who ate spinach.
3. The Shiga toxin was isolated in Chris stool samples. Not Shigella. Chris was the only child where e-coli 0157:H7 was never isolated. I clarified this information to Mark in April when I spoke to him on the phone and on a blog in June. Despite clarifying this information twice, he still chooses to make false statements.
4. When Mark McAfee spoke to me at Loma Linda University Childrens Hospital, my child was on a ventilator with his hands tied to the bedrail, had chest tubes on both sides of his chest expelling the fluid built up in his body, his testicles were the size of a grapefruit, and he was receiving dialysis. I openly shared information with him because I had nothing to hide. At this time, Chris had been at LLUCH for about 5 or 6 days. I told Mark he had been originally diagnosed at Kaiser with Shigella (he had that diagnosis to two days), when he arrived at LLUCH the diagnosis was changed to e-coli 0157:H7. The reason it was changed to e-coli 0157:H7 is because he developed HUS. Shigella infection turning into HUS is unheard of in the U.S. This is seen in third world countries where there are serious sanitation problems. None of the nephrologists at LLUCH had ever treated a case of Shigella that turned into HUS. I also freely shared that he consumed both spinach and raw milk. At this time, packaged Dole spinach had not yet been implicated. Again, Chris did not eat packaged Dole spinach.
5. As to whether the 3 children all had the same matching e-coli blueprint, Im working on getting that information from the state of California. Its information that was stated many times in the media and I want to know if it is valid.
I shared private information with Mark McAfee in good faith. I was very kind and respectful to him in the midst of my own personal tragedy. I empathized with his situation and could only imagine the severe stress he was also experiencing. I even hugged the man. It never dawned on my for one second that he would use any of the information I shared with him to spin the facts in a deceitful way.
Thank you for taking the time to read all of this information.
Sincerely,
Mary McGonigle-Martin
You had mentioned in a post a few months ago, I believe, that you had tried to get Sally to change her website. By any chance have you sent a snail mail letter? I have found that sending a real letter has a better impact. For some reason, people perceive sending a letter by post as "taking the time and effort" to get the point across. It has made a difference for me with legislators. I never have been able to figure out why things are perceived in that way. Anyway, just a thought.
I hope Sally will fix the error, and I hope Chris is doing well.
Chris is doing well. Hes put on 9 pounds this year. We are blessed. I attribute many of his positive improvements to the probiotics Ive added to his diet. Its the only thing thats different in his diet prior to becoming ill.
Ted Beals
Done!
So, Mark’s integrity is not what I thought either. Who can we trust these days!!! I am very upset this is happening to you, I am very upset myself reading this. I am so glad your son is doing better and so sorry you went through this hell.
If Sally does not respond or do anything about this (she needs to apologize!), I would be tempted to send this letter to all the WAP chapter leaders I know to raise concern. How would you feel about that?
I can also send this to Summer from Dee Creek. Have you sent this to Mark?
Are you still drinking raw milk?
Maybe we should not go through David’s blog with this. You can contact me here maria 22000 comcast net (leaving out the spaces and inserting the symbol)
Hugs,
maria.
http://www.uwex.edu/milkquality/PDF/btcreinemann.pdf
http://drinc.ucdavis.edu/dairyp/dairyp6.htm
http://www.ext.vt.edu/pubs/dairy/404-405/404-405.html
These links are FYI. I am sure that many have bought milk from the store only to have it become "spoiled" long before the date on the carton.Most likely the cause is poor handling. (Though after reading about all those who have become ill from pasteurized dairy, I question that theory). Other than the nasty conditions at the factory farms, the processing of products appears to be the most frequent cause of contamination of food stuffs. The more I read, the less I desire pasteurized or processed foods.
http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=6794
No word if they have caught the felony spinach growers.
http://jds.fass.org/cgi/content/full/87/9/2822
Look at Figure 5 in that article (full text is free). You can see the distribution of coliform counts in bulk tank milk.
Where the 75% comes from, I don’t know. But there is another variable in all of this: I believe it is 3 of 5 samples that must be below 10 per ml. Someone with more sleep, calculate the probability of passing 3 of 5 if each has a 20% chance. (But then they are not independent.)
Someone give me some sleep in a bottle.
The important point — I agree with David’s next post — none of this is really the issue. Freedom in my kitchen is the core issue here.
Amanda
The cheese thing is an interesting sidelight to this whole debate. The CDC data that Pete Kennedy obtained a few months back showed that raw milk has been responsible for an average 59 illnesses per year from 1973-2005.
http://www.thecompletepatient.com/journal/finally-some-hard-data-on-illnesses-from-raw-milkthe-governm.html
Of those, five were from raw milk cheeses. The only cases of listeriorsis were from the cheeses, with none from milk. The implication of the data is that the soft raw milk cheeses are a bit more risky for pathogens than milk, butter, cream, etc. Still, shouldn’t the consumer be the one to decide, as they do with other foods at risk, like ground beef, spinach, lettuce, deli foods?
Yes, the consumer should be the one to decide what they wish to eat. If they succeed in banning raw milk, what is next? Do you think that it would stop there?
"The implication of the data is that the soft raw milk cheeses are a bit more risky for pathogens than milk, butter, cream, etc."
Almost always the contamination is in the handling of the cheese after the make.
Also the regulators use the term "bathtub cheese"
to scare people ‘yuck! made in a bathtub?’ when in fact a few cheeses were made that way but the term stuck when other small stainless steel vats or vessels are used. It’s effective use of
scare tactics.
Do you know if there is a reasonably reliable source info on raw milk consumption rates? I looked in your link above but didn’t see any. It’s hard to assess risk in this case without knowing how many of us are drinking it. Raw cheese consumption is probably higher than raw milk, but I haven’t seen either statistic.
Amanda