It’s been nearly a year since I sat in on a small discussion at the Weston A. Price annual conference in Chicago, and heard a number of raw milk experts discuss the ins and outs of A1/A2 milk. The issue had become a hot topic, stimulated by publication of a book out of New Zealand, “The Devil in the Milk”, which argued that A2 milk, which lacks a genetically-determined protein fragment, improves drinkers’ health, while A1 milk, which has the protein, might well detract from health.
One farmer involved in the discussion said he had shifted his small herd so it consists entirely of A2 cows. Another farmer said the evidence on A1/A2 wasn’t convincing enough for him to shift his entire herd. And a veterinarian and a few others with background said essentially that the jury is still out. That’s pretty much what I wrote in a post more than a year ago.
Then the issue seemed to die down, as far as I could see, replaced by growing concerns about simple availability of raw milk, any raw milk, in the face of a rapidly expanding market, as well as the ongoing debate about milk safety, and related issues like competitive exclusion, discussed extensively following my previous post.
But last Friday, at a special session on raw milk at the national conference of the Biodynamic Farming and Gardening Association, where I spoke, together with Sally Fallon of the Weston A. Price Foundation and Michael Schmidt, the Canadian raw dairy farmer, the issue came up again. A woman attending the session, clutching her copy of “The Devil in the Milk”, wondered if the A1/A2 issue was being ignored, or even covered up, by raw dairy farmers and other raw milk proponents. She was concerned about the possibly damaging effects of A1 milk. A few other members of the audience of about 40 indicated they were interested as well, while others obviously had never heard of A1/A2 milk.
Sally Fallon explained her view that it’s not yet clear how important the A1/A2 matter is. “Let’s not start blaming the farmers and making their lives more difficult,” she said.
Michael Schmidt said a number of his herdshare members had asked him whether his dairy’s cows are A1 or A2. “My response is to ask them, ‘Have you had any health problems since you started drinking this milk?’ ” No one has had any difficulties, which he says indicates to him it’s likely not a significant issue.
The questioner seemed satisfied. My sense is that the A1/A2 issue is probably not a major one, at least as far as unpasteurized milk is concerned. But as people’s concerns grow about inadvertently consuming bad food, maybe it’s natural that there will be concerns about issues like this one.
***
The people who run Rawesome Food Club have a new web site and an appeal for donations to a legal defense fund.
The account on the site of Rawesome’s experience during and following the June 30 armed raid by at least five different local, state, and federal agencies says the authorities took 17 cases of food, without ice to keep them cold. Aajonus Vonderplanitz, one of the Rawesome founders, has said the food had a value of $11,000.
The web site indicates that the organization is mounting a legal defense against charges by the Los Angeles Office of Building and Safety that Rawesome is violating building codes. Vonderplanitz has also said he wants to sue the government for trespassing, kidnapping, and theft of goods.
In the meantime, the casualties mount. The web site says that Sharon Palmer, a farm owner who supplied goats milk to Rawesome under a lease agreement, and who was also raided June 30, has ended her agreement and sold the goats because of the trauma that raid and a previous one created for her young children. And MorningLand Dairy Raw Milk Cheese says in a blog post that it’s been ordered to destroy thousands of pounds of cheese after traces of listeria were found in some of the cheese seized in the Rawesome raid–this despite FDA tests at its Missouri plant showing no indications of listeria, and despite the fact the listeria was found many weeks after the raid. You’ll see from the comments on the company’s blog that there are lots of outraged folks.
No, the government doesn’t have to file charges against Rawesome. It can just periodically carry out such raids, and each time, harass a few small producers of nutrient-dense foods out of business. The American way of sterilizing the food supply?
Good luck to RAwsome! I'll contribute. Sorry to hear about Sharon Palmer. That is criminal.
Miguel, did you see this? http://www.naturalnews.com/029940_homeopathy_scientist.html
"Montagnier discovered that solutions containing the DNA of viruses and bacteria "could emit low frequency radio waves" and that such waves influence molecules around them, turning them into organized structures. The molecules in turn emit waves and Montagnier found that the waves remain in the water even after it has been diluted many times…."
I got to thinking about your recent sanitizer contamination posts – how their residues might be stimulating bacteria to morph?
-Blair
"…two mysterious molecules found in the blood stream and in many other parts of the body: vitamin D3 sulfate and cholesterol sulfate [Strott2003]. Upon exposure to the sun, the skin synthesizes vitamin D3 sulfate, a form of vitamin D that, unlike unsulfated vitamin D3, is water soluble. As a consequence, it can travel freely in the blood stream rather than being packaged up inside LDL (the so-called "bad" cholesterol) for transport [Axelsona1985]. The form of vitamin D that is present in both human milk [Lakdawala1977] and raw cow's milk [Baulch1982] is vitamin D3 sulfate (pasteurization destroys it in cow's milk, and the milk is then artificially enriched with vitamin D2, an unsulfated plant-derived form of the vitamin)."
http://stephanie-on-health.blogspot.com/2010/09/3-why-does-sulfur-deficiency-lead-to.html
Of course the artificial D2 version is nowhere near as healthy as the natural form.
David, Whether or not the claims about A2 milk are found to have merit, the idea from a marketing/money making standpoint was brilliant.
So brilliant, I fear that we will see that model repeated more and more often as folks race to capitalize on it:
The model – Do a few studies to prove whatever patents you've secured are superior, and then leave it up to the public to fund studies to refute yours. Meanwhile, market you're "superior" product like crazy while you roll in the dough.
Seems to me that unless the public maintains a skeptical stance until the trademarked A2 folks to do more to prove their own claims, we're opening a pandoras box for the future.
http://thebovine.wordpress.com/2010/10/02/nz-company-markets-sleep-time-a1a1-milk-with-bcm7-opiode-effect/
The real effect that Agencies are looking for is to move or scare a certian percentage of the consumers away, making it impossible for suppliers or producers to maintian the icome or volume to be profitable and sustainable.
Simple economics come into play after a raid and many producers do not, cannot hang on with the reduced numbers.
As for A1- A2 debate, I always had a problem with a company who was set on controlling the argument, its testing and promoting it through very narrow channels.
The other side of the coin, in very very few instances we are drinking and eating the products we think we are as it relates to the nutirent density of the genetic potential, supported by a complete profile of nutirents in the soil to attain that genetic potential and resulting human health.
Very few people have really eaten a really good tomatoe in the last 30 years, or are drinking what is promoted to be the best milk possible.
We are moving in the right direction, but we are just begining to see just how good things really can be, so for me the A1-A2 argument is a bit premature, but may be part of the system we are currently improving, not a system on to itself.
Tim Wightman
One point of clarification from the post…"And MorningLand Dairy Raw Milk Cheese says in a blog post that it's been ordered to destroy thousands of pounds of cheese after traces of listeria were found in some of the cheese seized in the Rawesome raid…"
Note that the Listeria tests used for regulatory purposes do not quantify the amount of Listeria; thus, there is no way of knowing whether the amount was "trace" or "massive" contamination. There is evidence that competitive exclusion can be effective in reducing Listeria in cheeses, but that biological system will be overwhelmed if the Listeria is present in large numbers. We don't know one way or the other how much Listeria was in the cheese sample(s) – trace, moderate or massive – given the type of test used.
One other point…while competitive exclusion has application in cheesemaking, there is no clear evidence that it is important for fluid milk. Same point for E. coli O157:H7, Campylobacter and Salmonella in fluid milk. At best, the experiments show mixed results similar to what you've been reading about on A1/A2 milk. There are some who cling tightly to the idea that fresh milk kills pathogens below the level of risk, but their evidence is no better than the A1/A2 data (and similarly one-sided when they write papers like the one in the WAPF newsletter where only data that supports the theory is presented, while any data – even from the same manuscript – that contradicts the competitive exclusion theory in fresh milk is left out of the discussion). Seems obvious that there is a financial motivation with the A1/A2 bias over-shadowing the possible health issues that remain unclear.
It is so much less clear where the motivation to skew the competitive exclusion data on fresh milk comes from among people who would seem to be otherwise smarter and more even-handed about topics of milk quality and safety.
MW
The A-2 Corp, years ago courted OPDC and OPDC said "no". The A-2 Corp required all raw milk that they tested and sold to be pasteurized under their brand. Their ideas were so good and made so much difference that they went bankrupt in North America.
A-2 pasteurized milk caused all sorts of allergies and serious lactose intolerance just like any CAFO processed milk anywhere. Dr. Tom Cowan even told me that he was sorry for writing "the forward to the book" before he knew what he knows now.
The problem with A-2 followers is that they do not think for themselves and believe everything they read "hook line and sinker"….they just follow unconfirmed, unverified writings done by two guys ( now dead ) from New Zealand. If A1 ( or Mixed A-2 and A1 milk like OPDC raw milk… cause we can not get tested and do not know what we have exactly ) was so bad then why does grass fed raw organic milk do all the same great things that A-2 is supposed to do???
Mike schmidt is absolutely right…and I say that:
"The Devil is not in the Milk"…."The Devil is in the Feed, Conditions and the Processing!!!".
http://www.organicpastures.com/pdfs/A-2%20OPDC%20position.pdf
The jury is still out for sure….they will not be back either. The court was adjourned because there is no evidence or science. This has all the signs of a New Zealand scam.
Mark
(Edited to remove names of individuals)
Ouch. I've heard rumors too of frauds where pasteurized milk is being sold as raw to gain the price mark-up. Obviously, there is no voluntary or regulatory body checking on such things…
MW
Perhaps the question we ought to be asking is — Where is the motivation to force MorningLand Dairy to destroy all of that cheese, based on improperly collected and stored samples from a third party, which were tested months after the samples were collected?
Unfortunately, because of the balance of power in this relationship, that question will probably never be answered. The regulators can get away with mass murder (and are getting away with it, witness the mass deaths from FDA approved drugs) while a small raw milk dairy can simply be in bussiness with the wrong distributer, and be shut down and forced to destroy tens of thousands dollars worth of products because of a regulatory grudge.
You cannot sit there with a straight face and tell me your above post is even a reasonable assesement of the situation.
You can bet your curd I'm sitting with a straight face looking at the data – whether it be A1/A2, competitive exclusion, or a Listeria test result. Regarding the politics, I thought Scott Trautmann put forward a proposal that encompassed the science and addressed the "know your farmer" issues. He elevated the discussion in a way that could…but this blog only wants to attack vision. Kudos also to Mary Martin for reminding all of us about what is at stake.
Bill, you are smart, young and motivated. I hope all those qualities are put to best use and not manipulated into a tempting propaganda machine.
That is way more politics than I would choose to share on this blog, but good luck.
MW
That might be true but today the best source of power comes from the "send button" sent from a delighted raw milk mom that has healthy kids. The establishment can not attack a mom and can not shut her down. She is the ultimate sacred safe place….A place of truth and grace. She is all the science other moms need to hear and see. She is beyond doctors and drugs, She is a healer and a dollar voter with instincts and love.
Moms that know first hand what raw milk does for their families are sacred and untouchable….they drive this change.
Farmers….connect to them…feed them and you will feed yourselves.
Mark
re: the survival of pathogens in fluid milk. Campylobacter is one organism which perishes very easily. We saw this in Wisconsin last year, when a campy outbreak attributed to raw milk from one farm was suspected, a sample of milk from the offending batch was obtained and tested. It was less than 2 weeks old by that time, and turned up negative.
Competative exclusion is real, even in fluid milk, not just in cheese. But there are some cheese examples I want to throw at you.
Why is it that in France, some of their most cherished traditional raw milk cheeses are high moisture short aged lactic curd cheeses? Cheeses such as Eppoise de Bourgogne and Charcouce have long slow lactic coagulations, and spend a considerable incubation time at higher pH.
I am told by a French master cheesemaker that there is a traditional protected raw goat milk lactic curd cheese which has a minimum of a 36 hour coagulation!!! Compare this to the modern industrialized cheddar (made with high-acid cultures supplemented with Streptococcus Thermophilus, which doesn't normally live in traditional cheddar cultures), and which reaches its terminal pH in under 3 hours from the time the curd is set.
Or take the example of Vacherin Mont D'or, which is another high-moisture, short aged cheese, but is a renneted curd. It has almost no culture added to it, and takes a week to reach a pH below 5 at a cool temperature. (It is coagulated and drained at the pH of the fresh milk)
In the 1980's, shortly after the Swiss began pastuerizing their milk for Vacherin Mont D'or, there was a large listeria outbreak associated with the cheese which was initially blamed on the French raw milk version. Turned out later, it was actually the Swiss Mont D'or that caused the outbreak.
Compelling evidence of the importance of competative exclusion and diversity of micro-flora in food safety.
You can't argue with 2000+ years of traditions in raw milk. In Europe they understand this intuitively. And, I might add, the importance of the indigenous breed of dairy animal to the traditional cheese. Not surprising then, that most dairy cows in continental Europe are A2.
Not sure it was your intention, but you present a fabulous argument for prohibition of raw milk.
MW
Chris L.
Rawesome is a good example. There are no food safety issues, people haven't been getting sick, their members are willfully and knowingly choosing to eat such food. The only real reason for targeting them is they are competition.
Last, frustrating for those developing SSOP's and HACCP protocols and procedures is the sampling process. 25 grams of product is cultured as per FDA's BAM followed by State and contract labs. Does the sample include a washed or rinsed rind? Is it from the "core" of the age ripened cheese? If the sample includes both–how can it be determined where in the process putative or confirmed contamination actually occurred? Equally frustrating is that specific protocols and procedures used for sampling and testing–as well as detailed test results often must be obtained under the FOIA-further delays, lost sales, dairies in shut down mode–and lost product.
I agree with Tim W. and will add that just having a putative positive can have a profound economic impact on a small dairy-even one that has a history of compliance and cooperation with regulatory authorities. Even without considering political motivations, the policies and procedures impacting small dairies are poorly conceived, badly executed, and poorly managed to the further detriment of the producer, customer and even helpful and well intended inspectors. There are many issues at all levels.
Well, it's wonderfully funny anyway (raw spelled backwards means war). Absurdity with humor.
Chris L.
Not enough supporting research has been done to make claims. That sounds pretty familiar too. People who sell are not permitted to make health claims on herbal remedies, supposedly. We can do all the research we want. I can read CEU credits on herbal remedies. But people who sell aren't permitted to say what I have learned from medical research and pay to get credit for continuing education with. Seems kind of dumb to me.
Mark's last post on the value of mothers with children brought to mind Mother Earth worship, and the villianization of the great mother in ancient biblical times. If what I understand about such things holds truth, Sharon Palmer's persecution won't end with the sale of her goats. It won't end with the raw milk argument either.
Who can really believe any of this is about public health? Or even profit? There are some opportunists out there, but from my point of view, it is about the freedom to eat what I want to, and to produce and share locally. That is what it will always be about.