The Raw Milk Inspectors Come Calling, Again, at California's Largest Raw-Milk Dairy

The Complete Patient ^ | Sept. 9, 2007 | David E. Gumpert

[davidgumpert]

The sense of déjà vu was eerie. First the California Department of Food and Agriculture posted a press release on its site: It had ordered a recall of raw cream produced by Organic Pastures Dairy Co.

Then the Associated Press came out with a story...

[davidgumpert]

Just another case of protecting the public? California's largest raw-milk dairy is ordered by state agriculture officials to recall raw cream after tests showed the presence of listeria monocytogenes. The test is highly questionable--similar to testing on milk in New York and Pennsylvania, in which pathogens show up and no one becomes ill.

[Carry_Okie]

When it comes to food safety, government has no accountability anyway. Why we don't reform torts and insurance regulation and dump the entire system for private certification I cannot understand /sarc.

Insurance companies love a regulated market of socialized risk and an artificially high rate base. No risks to manage and lots of cash flow with which to play.

[Cicero]

Testing raw milk can be a rough call, but after reading the article I agree that this looks like political posturing.

As a spokesman from the company puts it, “Organic Pastures has just in the last few days purchased special equipment that ‘will test for all the politically significant bacteria.’”

Politically correct bacteria is about right, I’m afraid.

Ordinarily, drinking raw milk is good for you. It’s much like eating raw yogurt, because it contains beneficial bacteria that help crowd out malignant bacteria that may take over your guts. But raw milk has to be handled carefully, or it can be dangerous.

I suppose it’s expecting too much to hope that a bureaucratic government in a state like California will be sensible, or that leftist newspapers will cease letting themselves be used like this.

[Graybeard58]

I drank raw milk all the time I was growing up, I’m 62 now but sure as shootin, I will die some day.

[Thebaddog]

I was just out in the San Francisco area last month and had the opportunity to buy a $9.00 gallon of organic milk. I passed. think of it, $9 for a gallon of milk that is JUST milk. Nothing else. The Amish need to get in on this scam.

[tbw2]

Do the Amish drink raw milk?

[Lil'freeper]

A Nutrition Ping List For Those Interested in the Research of Dr. Weston A. Price

SSDD

[traviskicks]

“But every opportunity they (government regulators) have they will stick a knife in our back.”



Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.

[bannie]

They probably take measures to keep their operations clean.

:-)

[jas3]

When it comes to food safety, government has no accountability anyway. Why we don't reform torts and insurance regulation and dump the entire system for private certification I cannot understand /sarc.

Insurance companies love a regulated market of socialized risk and an artificially high rate base. No risks to manage and lots of cash flow with which to play.

That's a curious consipracy theory you've got there. Why wouldn't you presume that there would be new entrants into the commercial insurance market which would price down that cash flow stream to just above their own cost of capital as in every other industry or financial service?

The regulation has little to do with commercial insurance and everything to do with mainstream producers recgonizing that when bad milk from Producer A kills a few children that nobody drinks milk from Producer B, Producer C, etc.

I am also opposed to government regulation of food (among other regulations), however you misperceive the source of such regulations. They are largely welcomed by the mainstream producers and are largely initiated in response to specific problems in the food stream in which people die.

jas3

[pbmaltzman]

I’ve consumed products from Organic Pastures, and I think their stuff is great. Wish the f-—ing government would leave them alone.

[Carry_Okie]

That's a curious consipracy theory you've got there. Why wouldn't you presume that there would be new entrants into the commercial insurance market which would price down that cash flow stream to just above their own cost of capital as in every other industry or financial service?

Because compliance to the regulations have economies of scale with which only the really big players can comply. Regulation has always worked that way, since the days of Teddy Roosevelt structuring his attack on the "robber barons" in such a way that his buddy JP Morgan made out like a bandit.

I am also opposed to government regulation of food (among other regulations), however you misperceive the source of such regulations. They are largely welcomed by the mainstream producers and are largely initiated in response to specific problems in the food stream in which people die.

If you'd spent as much time on the topic as I have, you'd see it differently.

[mad_as_he$$]

Many modern dairies are operated automatically. There is no human presence needed except to haul the milk off. They even make an immediate determination if the milk has some (kinds) contamination and it never gets into the tank. The units are sterilized between every animal.

[Cicero]

“Do the Amish drink raw milk?”

I wasn’t sure, so I did a google search. Evidently they do:

http://www.google.com/search?q=Amish+raw+milk&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLF

Here in Vermont you can get local milk and eggs and other natural foods without paying through the nose for them. Where it becomes a problem is if you live in the city and have to buy your food at the end of a long chain of factory farms and middlemen. If you don’t like that you get to pay double or triple for “organic” foods at your high end specialty food shop.

[383rr]

“But every opportunity they (government regulators) have they will stick a knife in our back.”

bump

[davidgumpert]

Yes, you will die some day, as will I and everyone else on the planet.

[davidgumpert]

Neat phrase, isn’t it, “politically significant bacteria”?

[davidgumpert]

Interesting idea, but I suspect the insurance companies would just enforce the “politically correct” risks. No, I’m afraid there has to be an ongoing debate on this issue.

[television is just wrong]

raised on raw milk NEVER got sick.

[hedgetrimmer]

No, its another case of making it so expensive to produce food in this country that all the food producers with any liquidity will leave. This will open up even more of our food supply to China, and other communist nations that use slave labor and little or no safety standards for production.

It is in fact the agenda of the federal government under the last three presidents to do this, so you shouldn’t be suprised at all.