Growing up as a millennial, you got your gallon at the store and that was that. In grade school each year at least a paragraph if not a chapter was dedicated to the heroics of Louis Pasteur and his world renown life saving pasteurization discovery. But now, local dairy farms are offering raw milk, and I’ve a few friends who are swearing by it, as tastier, helping with digestion, skin issues, etc. but the CDC would lead me to believe if we buy raw milk we will all get E. coli and die . So just knowing that so many of you are leap years ahead of me on such subject. What’s the deal? Raw milk yes? Raw milk risky business?
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Before pasteurization, all milk was unpasteurized. "Miraculously", millions drank it/used it.
That, in and of itself, says something.
Raw milk appears to be safe when proper procedures are in place and also appears to protect against allergies and asthma.
Raw milk producers with high levels of hygiene and safety
Excerpt:
“The aim of this paper is to describe practices that have been developed for safe raw milk production. The German Vorzugsmilch is a federally regulated programme for legal raw milk production that was established already in the 1930s to provide raw milk with high hygienic standards controlled for zoonotic diseases to consumers. The Raw Milk Institute is a non-profit organisation established in California that has developed a voluntary safe raw milk programme in North America. RAWMI has developed a risk analysis and management system for raw milk dairy farmers to assist farmers in making individually tailored solutions for various production systems. In British Colombia, Canada, small herd share farms have employed good manufacturing practices, a risk management approach and performed monthly samples for pathogens and indicator bacteria to demonstrate safety and consistency. The major components of the raw milk systems applied, and the results of regular milk microbial indicator bacteria are presented. For the German system, the results from standard monthly pathogen tests are compared to zoonotic pathogen tests from other milk sources. The overall results indicate that raw milk can be produced with a high level of hygiene and safety in various systems.”
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Raw Cow’s Milk and Its Protective Effect on Allergies and Asthma
Excerpt:
“Living on a farm and having contact with rural exposures have been proposed as one of the most promising ways to be protected against allergy and asthma development. There is a significant body of epidemiological evidence that consumption of raw milk in childhood and adulthood in farm but also nonfarm populations can be one of the most effective protective factors.”
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Raw Cow’s Milk Prevents the Development of Airway Inflammation in a Murine House Dust Mite-Induced Asthma Model
Excerpt:
“Raw milk prevented both HDM-induced AHR and pulmonary eosinophilic inflammation, whereas heated raw milk did not. Both milk types suppressed the Th2-polarizing chemokine CCL17 in lung homogenates and reduced lung Th2 and Th17 cell frequency. IL-4 and IL-13 production after ex vivo restimulation of lung T cells with HDM was also reduced by both milk types. However, local IL-5 and IL-13 concentrations were only suppressed by raw milk. These findings support the asthma-protective capacity of raw cow’s milk and show the importance of reduced local type 2 cytokine levels. Heated raw milk did not show an asthma-protective effect, which indicates the involvement of heat-sensitive components. Besides causal evidence, this study provides the basis for further mechanistic studies.”
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Raw Milk-Induced Protection against Food Allergic Symptoms in Mice Is Accompanied by Shifts in Microbial Community Structure
Excerpt:
“The mechanism underlying the allergy-protective effects of raw cow’s milk is still unknown, but the modulation of the gut microbiome may play a role.”
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Direct Inhibition of the Allergic Effector Response by Raw Cow’s Milk—An Extensive In Vitro Assessment
Excerpt:
“In conclusion, we demonstrate a direct inhibition of the allergic effector response by raw cow’s milk. Next, to the already described capacity to modulate T cell responses, the present study shows that raw cow’s milk is also able to directly influence mast cell activation. Mast cell activation was not affected by heated raw milk and shop milk, supporting the current evidence for a loss of allergy protection after milk processing and more specifically, after heat treatment.”