The CDC Wouldn't Cook the Books on Raw Milk Illnesses, Hospitalizations, Deaths...Or Would It?
Friday, August 20, 2010 at 10:35AM 
We've seen a steady stream of articles about raw milk in the major media over the last few months. And many of them include some variation of this statement from the CDC about raw milk's dangers, such as was contained in an article in The Economist:
"Public health advocates dispute the health benefits, though, and say that raw milk is inherently risky, especially for children, old people, and anybody with health problems. Between 1998 and 2008, according to the Centers for Disease Control, some 1,600 people became sick after drinking the stuff. Nearly 200 were hospitalised and two died..."
Each time I see those numbers re-stated, I find myself shaking my head. They can't be right, I sense. I decided a few days ago to try to get into them and, lo and behold, they are high, at least if you compare them to numbers CDC has previously issued about raw milk illnesses. Plus, they are misstated in a very important way when it comes to so-called deaths from raw milk. It's a little complicated, so bear with me.
1. Total number of illnesses 1998-2008. If you take the certified CDC numbers provided to the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund's Freedom-of-Information Act request in 2007 (covering 33 years 1973-2005) and isolate the period 1998-2005--you get 1,046 illnesses.
Then, you go to the official national CDC outbreak tables (Foodborne Outbreak Online Database) for the period 2006 and 2007. Those tables are supposed to be the most up to date, but they don't go beyond 2007, so it's not clear where the CDC is getting its 2008 numbers from. Those two years (2006 and 2007) showed 172 additional illnesses attributed to raw dairy, for a total of 1,218.
So for 200,8 I went to a set of tables maintained by Cornell University, which draw on newspaper articles, and is pretty close to CDC for other years, and it showed 36 illnesses for 2008.
So, using the CDC's own data for 1998-2007 (and Cornell for 2008), I came up with a total of 1,254 illnesses. This is nearly 30% fewer than the 1,600-plus reported in the Economist and other papers.
2. Hospitalizations. Going through the CDC foodborne illness tables, I come up with about 25 hospitalizations, not the 200-plus CDC claims in the media. That includes one case of 12 hospitalizations from queso fresca cheese in 2003 in Texas--cheese almost certainly made from milk not intended to be served raw.
3. Deaths. Here is where I believe CDC is being most seriously misleading. It says there have been two deaths from raw milk, as if to suggest two people gulped down raw milk and dropped dead. The two deaths, it turns out, (according to the CDC's table I linked to above) both occurred during 2003. One was in California, and one in Texas (the same case as the 12 hospitalizations I mentioned previously). Both were from queso fresca cheese and, as I said before, almost certainly came from conventional milk intended for pasteurization. I say that because queso fresca is most typically made in the Hispanic communities, and generally from milk bought informally from farms that normally send their milk for pasteurization.
The reality is that there have been zero deaths from milk intended to be sold unpasteurized for the 1998-2008 period (versus 3 deaths from pasteurized milk in Massachusetts in 2007, according to the CDC table). And from all I can tell, zero deaths from raw milk going back to at least the mid-1980s--a period of at least 25 years.
Maybe the people at realrawmilkfacts.com can help unravel the discrepancies, since the site has all kinds of studies and statements from the CDC and FDA saying raw milk causes huge numbers of illness. Or possibly Milky Way can help, since MW posted some data on illnesses for 2010 following my previous post.
But as several people noted following my previous post, and have pointed out repeatedly, the government has a double standard for raw milk versus other foods. The current debacle over contaminated eggs is just another example--a recall of eggs from a large producer rather than a shutdown of the offender. The big problems in our food system have nothing to do with small producers of raw milk, but much more to do with the factory producers. But the authorities seem unwilling to stop at anything to disparage raw milk, including providing misleading data.
Reader Comments (41)
The campaign against raw milk depends on deceit.
Raw producers and consumers must let the light shine on these vermin...and spread the truth about healing foods.
Good job David.
You hit the bulls eye one more time. Great investigatory journalism comes through once again.
Raw milk is an inconvenient truth....for the FDA and Big dairy it is so very inconvenient that modern raw milk is not the same distilery raw milk of the 1890's. It is an inconvenient truth that the market for fluid CAFO raw milk is dying and taking farmers with it...now that we know that consumers just can not drink the dead filthy allergenic stuff and now that doctors prescribe not to drink it.
For the FDA and Big Dairy....true science and the truth of it all are such big barriers to selling their product. How inconvenient that their lies have come how to roost...Now even the CDC data does not come to their rescue...
They need to hire Donald Rumsfield and just create a whole new database that matches their needs and their lies....They need " raw milk shock and awe" they need to find Raw Milk weapons of mass destruction. How terribly inconvient that the data actually says that it is their dead stuff that is killing.
Sorry FDA and Big Dairy....we are not following this time....you have been outed and Big CAFO Dairy is now morally and economically bankrupt. In America one thing that can not be covered up is bankruptcy. Big CAFO Dairy is starving through econimic Darwinism.
Mark
The overwhelming majority of raw milk consumed in this country comes from dairy producers who milk their herd, sell some raw, and sell the balance for pastuerization.
So now you are creating another completely artificial division among dairy farmers that is intended to blame bad outcomes from raw milk consumption on "somebody else" -- not those who are your self-appointed "good guys" who have a small enough herd and large enough customer base to sell all their herd's output as raw milk. Real nice. Just what dairy farmers need, more attempts to tell them they are doing something wrong.
I find it telling that you chose to focus on a turn of phrase rather than the heart of my post about the data problems. But you are correct, I should have said that the milk was from dairies producing milk not intended to be consumed unpasteurized.
David
There are many in the raw milk movement that disagree whole heartedly with those who try and play both sides of the fence.
Actually, I think you'll find that the majority of raw milk producers are small, with just a few cows, and sell to quite a limited number of folks. Sure these aren't the high profile producers...the ones that get all the attention...but they are the ones that are supplying a good bit of the milk...one 'neighborhood' at a time.
What do you think of the actions of the CDC? Are you OK with the skewered numbers? It's obvious here that they've come to a conclusion, and are fabricating numbers to support their agenda.
Links to the photos:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/news_cut/archive/2010/08/do_you_know_where_your_milk_co.shtml
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2010/08/19/raw-milk-sales/
David, I'll respond to your question about the CDC statistics separately.
MW
http://www.ftcldf.org/press/press-FDA-lawsuit-round-one.htm
It appears that the FDA will have to finnally start to respond to the raw milk community instead of ignorring it.
I have had a formal FDA "citizens petition" pending with the FDA for 1.9 years and still no answer or activity. Perhaps the FTCLDF can use my petition as a part of its next step?
One thing for sure, the FDA is avoiding their day in federal court. When that day comes, there will be no place to hide, no fake CDC data to missquote or recreate to their benefit, no Russian Roulette raw milk bashing, Sheehan and his minions at NCIMS will be brought to the bench and asked the hard questions and it will be contempt of court if they refuse to answer truthfully.
When Judge Oliver Wanger in Fresno CA dealt with the FDA last year, he told them that their was no basis to argue that OPDC was a not a clean and legal product and that the issues did not deal with the legality or safety of raw milk in CA, that the FDA issues were only related to the transport of raw milk over state lines. The FDA had to admit that their were no issues about the safety of raw milk in CA or its legality...their only issue was the transport of it over state lines.
To hear this statement....it was hard not to laugh. The judge had a hard time not laughing. It seemed like such a joke. A joke on the FDA and their filthy PMO milk and the Big Dairy politics that hate raw milk.
Regulator,
Your quote:
"There is no such thing as "conventional milk intended for pasteurization." That is called raw milk. "
By the way....there are definitely "two raw milks in America". One can become the other but the not vice versa. Clean can become dirty but dirty can not become clean!!
In CA raw milk for people must be so clean that it passes pasteurized milk standards with out being first pasteurized. The PMO raw milk can be as filthy as allowed by PMO...and that means as many pathogens as may be present....they do not test for pathogens under the PMO.
So I will tell you that you are either uniformed or just damn ignorant to think that all raw milk is the same!!
These are the kinds of lies that betray all Americans.
Mark
Thank you for digging into this - I noticed the two deaths attributed to raw milk came up earlier this year. Indeed, you are a rare journalist !
Another CDC credibility gap:
This morning I listened to NPR's story on Guardasil a vaccine that purportedly protects against cervical cancer. It is intended for adolescent girls before they engarge in sexual activity. NPR reported that the CDC is now recommending that all adolescent boys take this too; regardless 0f the fact that boys don't have a cervix. CDC contends that boys can spread the HPV virus that causes cervical cancer, so they should take it too.
Dissenting doctors point out that there is no scientific data that supports this recommendation, but CDC responded that it might have benefit, so we should implement dosing standards akin to annual school vaccines.
Here we have a national health organization advocating drugs with no proven benefit to young boys for a disease they don't get - with no scientific evidence of benefit.. (no health benefits - this recommendation does have clear financial benefits however...somewhere near double profits?)
I wonder when I'll be seeing ads for women taking a vaccine against prostate cancer? Who knows - there could be some benefit somewhere.
As long as I stay away from raw milk, that is. Because after all, according to the CDC, there is no scientific data to support it's consumption.
-Blair
Did Lykke, CP, Regulator and Sheehan swear an oath to protect filthy dead PMO milk?
It sure seems like it.
It would also appear that they deny the existance of the CA Ag code that provides the standards and legal "Standard of Identity" for Retail Authorized tested inspected
GRADE A RAW MARKET MILK....thats the kind that is legally sold in 375 stores in CA.
Why is it that they did not swear an oath to uphold this legally binding law....a law signed by the governor of the state of CA??? they support some laws but not others???
That is an agenda talking. That is politics on shaky ground.
I would love to know if any one of them actually drinks pasteurized milk as an adult?
Follow the money....this is not about safety.
If it was about safety....some one would have died from raw milk in the last 37 years of collecting CDC data. Nada....zero deaths....no bodies....
The body counts belong to the dead dirty milk....
Mark
I would never purchase raw milk from a farm that looks like this.
We are small farmers that raise in our large three storey c. 1800 barn sheep, turkey's, chickens and ducks . . . . . they are never exposed to these kinds of conditions . . . . and our barn smells sweet . . . . . like fresh mowed hay.
There is no excuse for this lack of husbandry . . . someone needs to take a broom and power washer to these rafters pronto.
Kind regards,
Violet
www.kilbyridgefarmmaine.blogspot.com
I really appreciate your comment and insights. It is my opinion that the outbreaks traced to farms (e.g., not food handling problems in restaurants or homes) are due to correctable mistakes whether talking about raw milk, eggs, spinach, peanut paste...I recently visited two very small raw milk farms and found exquisite care to hygiene and animal husbandry. Neither one quite met the standards in the Tim Wightman video, but relative to their scale, I had no worries trying some kefir.
MW
Credibility is indeed lacking. http://www.wyeth.com/hcp/pristiq
The warnings & precautions alone can scare you off..not to mention the need to monitor cardiac, liver and kidney functions..What does that tell a person? Don't the TV ads state; "Pristiq (it is either this one or another one in the ad) is thought to work by...." Thought to work? As if they aren't sure? They give out pills like candy and people are not taught how to deal with any problems, whether mental or physical. But then there really isn't much money in dealing with the problems, is there? http://www.gardasil.com/ Prescribing information is informative. page 9 shows systemic complications from this..wouldn't want my child to be in that %- would make her a statistic? Why would a shot make you faint? People who faint may become stiff or shake?? A seizure? Geesh and people allow this to be injected into their kids?
Shame on you David, for showing in print the lies of the feds..Don't you know that you aren't supposed to think for yourself? They know better than you what is good for you.....(said with tongue in cheek) Thanks for pointing out what many already knew and/or speculated as lies.
If any of you know anyone in beautiful Humboldt County in Norther CA...please have them attend the BOS hearing on August 24th to petition for change of 512.4 to allow the sale of raw milk.
The Central CA Girls Scouts have just partnered with OPDC to provide Raw Milk to go with their GS Cookies....it is an exclusive cross promotion campaign.
The Girls Scouts reported to us that they have had no support and nothing but problems with the pasteurized milk industry ( and pasteurized milk because of allergies and lactose intolerance and more and more girls not wanting to drink it.....not to mention doctors that warn against it ). It appears that the Girls Scouts have concluded that Pasteurized Milk is not good for the Girls of America and voted for OPDC RAW MILK INSTEAD!! Their girls love it!!!
13,000 central CA GIrls Scouts will have the opportunity to earn their "RAWMILK & COOKIES" GS Patch by visiting OPDC, milking a cow, learning where real food comes from, feeding calves, making raw milk ice-cream and learning about immune systems and gut biodiversity.
One things is for certain....Lykke, CP, Regulator and Sheehan will be grinding what is left of their teeth over this.... Grind away!!!
Mark
Are you going to warn them about the risk of drinking raw milk if any have a compromised immune system? Or the fact that children have an underdeveloped immune system and raw milk is risky if a pathogen is present. What about any kids that may be taking antibiotics. Might not be a good idea for them to drink raw milk. Gosh, might not be a good idea to start all of this in the hottest months of the summer when cows are stressed by the heat. It is e.coli shedding season.
Bad things have happened on dairy farms in the past when visitors came to the farm and tried the raw milk
cp
Have you ever been to a CAFO chicken barn in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia . . . . or smelled a CAFO beef yard in the Midwest. Or even a CAFO Smithfield Pig Farm in the Piedmont?
Would I ever puchase meats or products from these companies such as Smithfield, Purdue, Tysons, Pilgrim, Dean foods, etc., etc., Nope, never . . . . . the smells and confined filth of these places turns me off . . . . which is why we are growing our own food for not only our family, but our community as well.
Nearly a billion eggs recalled for salmonella says it all. I will bet that these eggs were from battery cages . . . has the USDA or FDA etc., shut these egg farms down . . . . not that I have heard. But then again . . . . we have a double standard with regards to small farms producing raw milk that have problems such as the Hartmanns.
Smaller is better . . . . We need millions of small farms dedicated to raising livestock and produce in a sustainable, humane, and clean way . . . . when this happens . . . all of the above CAFO's will be put out of business and much of the illnesses due to Salmonella, Campy, E-coli, etc. will become very, very rare indeed.
With very best regards,
Violet
www.kilbyridgefarmmaine.blogspot.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/21/AR2010082102822.html?hpid=topnews
The outbreak, which has sickened 23 people in Oregon, including many kids, prompted the company to recall its milk, half & half, cream and buttermilk sold under various labels as well as its own brand of orange juice and fruit drinks."
"The outbreak, which first appeared in October, involves Salmonella Braenderup, a relatively rare strain that sickens an average of about six people a year in Oregon."
"No one considered that Umpqua's pasteurized milk -- which should be safe -- could be a problem. The dairy is regularly inspected by the Oregon Department of Agriculture, and has a good record.
"Their equipment works and the milk is all brought up to 170 degrees and salmonella can't survive that," Cieslak said.
Then last week Oregon officials visited one of Umpqua's plants in Roseburg, taking swabs of surfaces. Lab results this week showed it was contaminated with Salmonella Braenderup. "
The Oregonian, 18 Aug 2010. Full article: http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2010/08/roseburgs_umpqua_dairy_recalls.html