Raw Milk - A Three Part Series, Part II

One day my boyfriend announced that he wanted to buy a cow so that we could drink raw (non-pasteurized) milk. Now this wouldn’t be a new animal for our farm, since we live in New York. Hmmm. And, isn’t pasteurization a good thing? The debate about raw milk versus pasteurized is a heated one, and comprises the second part of our series on milk. Here’s what I found about raw milk (and whether or not we bought the cow).

The Raw Milk Laws
As it turns out, my boyfriend didn’t want to install a cow in our urban garden, he wanted to join a cow-share program; a covert way of gaining access to a beverage pretty difficult to buy in our state. Drinking raw milk is not illegal, but in many areas, purchasing it for human consumption is. Each state determines the details of raw milk sales. It is illegal to sell it for human consumption in 15 states, and available with restrictions in 26 states. Around these restrictions raw milk lovers have been scrambling to set up clandestine routines to get their milk. One of several loopholes used by consumers is a cow-share program, which allows the shareholder a percentage of milk from “their” cow. The cow lives on a dairy farm and is cared for and milked by a farmer, the milk is then delivered to you-thus no money is actually exchanged for the milk itself.

Why Pasteurize?
When I first starting hearing about raw milk my mind went straight back to a grade school black and white educational film about the miracle of pasteurization-how treating milk with heat followed by rapid cooling would kill all of the evil pathogens lurking in there. And looking at the history of the dairy industry, pasteurization was indeed a bit of a miracle. With 19th century industrialization came very unsanitary dairy farms. When pasteurization was introduced to dirty Victorian milk, infant survival rates saw a dramatic increase. By 1917, pasteurization was legally required or officially encouraged in most big cities.

By eliminating most of the pathogens that cause disease, including E. coli, salmonella and listeria, health official say that pasteurization has helped lower infectious-disease rates in the U.S. more than 90 percent over the past century. So pasteurization seems good-but I am also inclined to have a deeper trust in food that has seen as little processing as possible, albiet from clean farms, so the idea of raw milk was very intriguing. And if it’s so unhealthy, why are so many seemingly intelligent people drinking it?!

Types of Pasteurization
There are four types of pasteurization, each with a designated minimum temperature to which the milk must be subjected for a minimum amount of time. They range from Vat Pasteurization which requires that milk be held at 145 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes, to Ultra Pasteurization (UP) which requires a minimum temperature of 280 degrees Fahrenheit for 2 seconds. Most national brands of milk are ultra-pasteurized because it is quick and dramatically increases shelf life (UP milk can stay fresh for up to two months). Vat pasteurization, the most gentle of the methods, is a costlier process and the milk has a shorter shelf life. (Hence it is not viable for large-scale dairy farms.) Vat pasteurization is the method for preparing milk for starter cultures in the processing of cheese, yogurt, and buttermilk-that suggests to me that the vat process leaves some life in the milk.

Why Raw?
Advocates for raw milk claim that the process of pasteurization destroys the beneficial bacteria, proteins, and enzymes that aid in digestion. Specifically, raw milk contains immunoglobins, lipase and phosphates that are killed by heat. Raw milk contains vitamins C, B12 and B6, much of which can be lost to pasteurization. Healthy bacteria naturally found in milk, such as Lactobacillus acidophilus, is also lost during heat treatment. Raw milk proponents point out that these “friendly” bacteria aid in digestion and boost immunity. According to an article in Time Magazine, some people with a history of digestive-tract problems, such as Crohn’s disease, swear by the curative powers of non-pasteurized milk. Others praise its nutritional value and its ability to strengthen the immune system.

A common observation among raw milk proponents is that the dangerous pathogens found in raw milk are directly connected to the outrageously awful conditions of factory farming-mostly due to diseased animals. It is far easier to pasteurize milk than to stop industrialized farming. When you get milk from a clean, smaller farm where the animals are healthy, raw milk is not dangerous.

Our Cows
Quite frankly, the argument for raw milk makes perfect sense to me, but in the end I just couldn’t completely shake a lifetime of pasteurization dogma. Maybe if my boyfriend and I could buy raw milk legally and locally I would have been swayed-but as it is we ended up with a compromise. We take occasional trips two hours north to buy raw milk at Hawthorne Valley Farm, one of the farms in our state that is certified to sell raw milk. But the bulk of our milk is purchased weekly at our local farmers market. We are fortunate to have an amazing dairy farm that supplies high-quality milk to the city markets. The milk is minimally processed-it is not homogenized (meaning that the cream can separate to the top) and it is vat pasteurized, retaining some of that healthy bacteria.

By purchasing this less processed milk we get clean milk that hasn’t had the daylights zapped out of it, we support a local family farm, cut down on waste with returnable glass bottles, and it is actually cheaper than supermarket organic milk. But the best part? We get to drive upstate to the farm and visit the 55 hormone-free, grass-chomping cows that are making our milk-it’s almost like having our own cows.

Cow Milk - A Three Part Series, Part I

For many, milk is nearly as fundamental as water—the definition of “wholesome” in a glass. The choice has traditionally been simple: whole or skim? But as the scientific and political debates about different kinds of milk increase, so do the options. The choices are confounding. In this first of a series of three on milk, find out the one sure thing we recommend about milk.

Health-conscious people, animal advocates, the scientific community, and the dairy industry all have very strong feelings about milk. I have seen debates among friends fierce enough to rival the Hatfields and McCoys: Organic vs. conventional, raw vs. pasteurized, animal vs. soy. And when you bring in the literature from professionals—oh boy.

In the midst of all the arguments, despite the conflicting information pelting us from non-dairy proponents on one side and dairy industry advocates on the other, our research has made one thing clear. If you drink cow’s milk, make sure it is free of Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH)!

The rBGH Hormone Story
Oh rBGH, you naughty little genetically engineered hormone. Developed by Monsanto in the 1980s and marketed under the name Posilac, rBGH (also called rSBT) was approved by the FDA in 1993. Approved by the FDA? Sounds good, safe even. However, in a strange twist of procedure, rBHG was tested on 30 rats for only 90 days—while most studies required by the FDA are performed on hundreds of rats and last for two years before approval is granted. How in the world can a genetically engineered hormone be deemed safe in 90 days?!

We won’t go into reports of Monsanto employees working for the FDA and all of the thrilling intrigue there…or the details about Monsanto’s history with horrifying chemicals…or Monsanto’s role in genetic modification.

Most of the World Has Banned It
No, we won’t go there—but we will tell you that Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, and all 25 nations of the European Union have banned rBGH. Codex Alimentarius, the U.N. body that sets food safety standards, has refused to approve the safety of rBGH not once, not twice, but three times.

With rBGH Human Cancer Cells Can Multiply Faster
rBGH is injected into dairy cows to increase milk production by stimulating a growth hormone called Insulin-Like Growth Factor 1 (IGF-1). We humans absorb this IGF-1, and guess what, it makes our cells grow faster, including cancer cells. It doesn’t take a hypochondriac to worry about what extra doses of cell-growing hormones might do to a body. As it turns out, it is no surprise that numerous studies have determined that increased levels of this hormone are connected to increased risks of prostrate, breast, colon, pancreatic, and lung cancers.

With rBGH You’ll Get Cow Antibiotics in Your Milk
With the 10 to 15 percent increase in milk production from rBGH, also comes a whopping increase in the rates of mastitis, an infection of the udders. Along with the problem this presents to the poor cow, this affects our milk in two ways. To treat mastitis the infected cows are pumped with antibiotics, which can pass through the milk.

Some people have allergies to specific antibiotics and their unexpected presence in food can cause reactions. Also, frequent exposure to low level antibiotics can cause resistance to them so that they are ineffective when needed to fight a human infection. According to the Centers for Disease Control, overuse of agricultural antibiotics is the biggest contributor to food-borne, antibiotic-resistant infections in humans.

…And Pus
Beyond the possibility of antibiotics being passed through milk to humans—mastitis causes another substance to pass to the drinker as well. And this isn’t pretty. As with all infections, mastitis creates an increased somatic cell count—which is the nice way of saying pus. This may sound far-fetched at first, like vegan propaganda or an urban food myth—but the FDA has an actual acceptable level of somatic cells allowed in milk. So there you go. Up to 750,000 somatic cells per milliliter are allowed in milk. Yuck.

What You Can Do
We try to be pretty open-minded here, but when it comes to milk we have one guiding principal that we’ll go to the mat for: If you can buy organic, do. It costs more, but it is an important place to spend the money if you can.

If you have a choice between organic brands, buy from smaller local dairy farms rather than national brands. As well, if you are unable to buy organic try to purchase milk produced from smaller local dairy farms. Smaller farms rely less on industrial dairy practices and have lower infection rates. Since Monsanto has lawsuits against dairies that label their milk “rBGH-free” some cartons may not use that specific language. Look for “hormone free” and “antibiotic free.”

The lobbying powers of Monsanto and the dairy industry are exceptionally strong, as is the literature from the scientific and anti-dairy communities. It really boils down to a “he said-she said” scenario. But even without all of the statistics and scientific facts being batted around, at the very least, who wants to drink milk from cows treated with a genetically modified hormone to make them produce more milk—polluted milk from infected, aching cows? Strive for milk from natural, happy cows—milk as wholesome as milk should be.

Coming up: Raw Milk, and Milk Alternatives. Stay tuned!

Recipe: Grapefruit Brulee

Here’s a simple dessert, a fit cure for wintertime blues. Simply broil the grapefruit slices until warm and irresistible. Follow them up with a strong cup of aromatic jasmine or Earl Grey tea.

INGREDIENTS
3 large pink or ruby-red grapefruits
6 tablespoons packed dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon butter cut into tiny pieces
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

1. Position oven rack about 5 inches from broiler; preheat broiler.

2. Slice the stem end and opposite end off each grapefruit. Stand the grapefruit, one cut-end down, on a work surface. Cut off the rind and pith with a sharp knife, making sure to remove all the white pith. Cut each fruit into 4 rounds, about 1/2 inch thick, by making slices parallel to the ones you made on the top and bottom.

3. Place the slices in a large baking pan in a single layer. Top each with 1 1/2 teaspoons brown sugar, dot with butter and sprinkle with a pinch of cinnamon and nutmeg.

4. Broil the grapefruit until bubbling and starting to brown, 6 to 8 minutes. Drizzle pan juices over each serving.

Serves 6.

Recipe nutrition per serving: 121 calories; 2 g fat (1 g saturated fat, 0g mono unsaturated fat); 5 mg cholesterol; 27 g carbohydrates; 1 g protein; 2 g fiber; 5 mg sodium; 215 mg potassium.

Nutrition Bonus: Vitamin C (60% daily value), Vitamin A (30% dv).

2 Carbohydrate Servings.

Exchanges: 1 fruit, 1 other carbohydrate, 1/2 fat.

Salmonella Outbreak and Pets

The peanut product recall seems to have taken on a life of it’s own. It’s not just peanut butter–the list wanders all over the place from brownie and donut products to salad dressings and pet food and treats. The FDA says that the risk of animals contracting salmonellosis is minimal, yet you should check the pet food products on the lengthy recall list to avoid any unnecessary risk.

Signs that your pet may have salmonella:

• Dogs and cats that become ill from salmonella generally will have diarrhea that may contain blood or mucus.
• Affected animals may seem more tired than usual, and may have a fever or vomit.
• Some cats do not have diarrhea, but will have a decreased appetite, fever, and excess salivation.
• Some dogs or cats may have Salmonella but may not appear to be sick. Well animals can be carriers and infect other animals or humans.

If your pet has consumed the recalled product and has these symptoms, contact your veterinarian.

Below is the list of “recalling firms” of pet food products. Check out the FDA list for links to the specific products and more information like UPC Code Number, lot descriptions, packaging size, etc.

Aggieville USA, Mountain Grove, MO
American Nutrition, Inc.
Carolina Prime
Carolina Prime Pet
Farm Style
Grreat Choice
Happy Tails
Healthy Hide
Healthy-hide Deli-wrap
Hill Country Fare
Integrity
Mill Creek
Next Gen Pet Products
Northwest Royal
Premium
Salix
Shoppers Valu
Springfield Prize
Vita Bone Flavors
Vita Snacks
Western Family Biscuits
Western Trade Group, Inc.
Yeaster

Also note that there is risk to humans from handling contaminated pet food products. To prevent foodborne illness when handling pet foods and treats, wash hands with hot water and soap before and after handling pet foods and treats and wash pet food bowls and utensils with hot water and soap after each use.

Again, if you believe your pet may be experiencing symptoms of salmonella, please bring your pet to your local veterinarian as soon as possible.

Euthanasia Alternative: Pet Hospice

Up until just a few years ago, people had one treatment option for their terminally ill pets–euthanasia–and the average veterinarian thought it better to get it over with sooner rather than later. But if Eleonora Babayants had listened to the veterinarian who advised her to put her dog Lima to sleep immediately, she and Lima would have lost out on their additional three years together. Instead of euthanasia, Babayants elected to care for Lima at home, using a relatively new program for dying pets called “pet hospice.” Pet hospice allows a dying animal to live out the rest of its life at home, pain free and surrounded by its loved ones.

“Human hospice and pet hospice are very similar ideas, because pet hospice is modeled on human hospice programs,” says Kathryn Marocchino, president and founder of Nikki Hospice Foundation for pets, a nonprofit organization that links sympathetic veterinarians with pet owners and provides education and advocacy concerning pet hospice. “The basic tenet is that you live each day until you die, and you make the best of it. And in both humans and animals, making the best of it revolves around pain management,” she says.

Veterinarians who are willing to work with individual clients to provide pet hospice at home can help train owners to deal with many of the day-to-day tasks that make caring for a dying pet so difficult. These include keeping the pet out of pain, teaching owners how to administer medications at home, even shots and IVs, instructing owners on how to keep wounds clean and prevent bedsores, and providing other suggestions to keep the pet comfortable.

“The pet owner needs a vet who is willing to support the owner with anything that may arise when taking care of a dying pet,” Babayants says. “In the case of my vet, she was willing to provide the hospice care for me.” She said, “If it gets to the point where I need to come to the house and help, I will.” Babayants says that although it was a bit intimidating for her, she learned how to give Lima fluids under the skin, administered shots, and learned what signs to look for to keep the dog out of pain. “The owner has to be willing to learn these basic medical techniques, but with the support of a vet who is willing to help, I found I could do anything I needed to,” Babayants says.

Another option for pet hospice care is frequent in-home visits from people trained in end-of-life care, like the veterinary students who participate in the Colorado State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences Pet Hospice program. From a medical point of view, it can be difficult and scary to have a terminally ill pet at home, according to Co-Team Manager of CSU’s program, Christie Long, “especially if they require a lot of support, like administering fluids for rehydration, giving medications, keeping feeding tubes clean. It’s so stressful for a sick animal to be brought into the clinic, so we can have a much less stressed patient if we can keep the pet comfortable at home.”

CSU’s hospice service is one of the only formal programs in the country to offer structured in-home hospice care, free of charge, but many other veterinarians are willingto work with owners on an individual basis to provide hospice care to pets. Nikki Hospice Foundation for pets offers no in-home services itself, but it offers referrals to a network of willing pet hospice veterinarians across the country.

When to say goodbye
Sometimes pet owners are so subjectively devoted to the idea of keeping their pets alive that they can’t see when it’s time to let go. According to Long, it’s the responsibility of the hospice team to carefully assess the animal’s pain level and encourage owners to make the decision to euthanize when the pet can’t be kept pain free. “One of our standards for accepting a pet into the hospice program is if the animal can be made comfortable at home, because we don’t want to assist you with keeping an animal alive who’s in pain,” Long says. “And sometimes, when the animal no longer can be kept out of pain and has no quality of life, then euthanasia can often be the best gift.” While the CSU team will never force euthanasia, they will withdraw from a case if they feel the animal is suffering needlessly and they can’t persuade the owner to choose euthanasia.

The Nikki Hospice Foundation for pets takes a slightly different approach, advocating for the owners’ right to choose how and when their pet dies, including the right to refuse euthanasia altogether. Marocchino founded the organization out of her own grief at finding no end-of-life assistance when her beloved cat, Nikki, was dying of acute feline kidney failure. Marocchino had taken Nikki to an emergency animal clinic, where vets pressured her to euthanize Nikki on the spot.

Instead of putting Nikki to sleep immediately, Marocchino took her to the University of California Davis, where they also recommended euthanizing the cat. “I had trained as a human hospice volunteer the year before, and so I kept asking if we couldn’t do some kind of home hospice care,” Marocchino says. “I was looking for pain management at home, but there just wasn’t anything they could offer me. So in the end, we made the decision to euthanize her there at UC Davis, on a cold steel table.” Marocchino, extremely traumatized by the event, walked away deciding then and there to help found a pet hospice foundation so that no one would ever have to go through what she had just suffered.

Despite the organization’s stance on freedom to choose euthanasia or not, Marocchino is clear that she personally believes the owner should let go when a pet cannot be kept pain free. “The point isn’t to just extend the animal’s life, it’s only if you can take advantage of that quality time,” Marocchino explains. “If the pet can’t be kept out of pain, or if it’s comatose, then it’s time to let go.” But the main point she makes is that the choice must lie solely with the pet owner–not with the veterinarian or even the hospice providers.

Grief, but no regrets
When you talk to owners who have gone the hospice route, they share one clear trait: They have no regrets. Nancy Haugen, an assistant clinical professor at the University of California at San Francisco School of Medicine, who chose in-home care over euthanasia for her dog, Brinn, says pet hospice allowed her to focus on her dog’s needs and encouraged her to follow her own intuition for his care. “When you can just focus on your own instincts, and on the animal’s instincts, that ends up creating a situation where there’s no regrets,” Haugen says. “Pet hospice gives us permission to trust a really old primitive part of us, and to trust the nature of the dog or cat. It allows a powerful end-of-life experience where there’s sorrow and grief, which is very natural, instead of trauma and regret.”

When Babayants chose the challenging path of pet hospice for her dog, Lima, she had no idea what she was getting herself into. But with the help of her regular veterinarian, Babayants was able to keep Lima comfortable so they could enjoy their final time together. “She had a very happy three years, she didn’t suffer, she ate, she went for long walks,” Babayants says. “The best doctors in the whole world, when they tell you how long your pet has to live, can’t really know for sure. We would have lost those three years together if I’d just put Lima to sleep. When she passed away, I was in terrible grief, but I never felt any regret.”

For more information:
Nikki Hospice Foundation
CSU’s Pet Hospice Program
The American Association of Human-Animal Bond Veterinarians

Easy Greening: Water Bottles

It is estimated that Americans will drink more than 30 billion single-serving bottles of water this year. Since these bottles are non-returnable, two million tons worth of that everlasting plastic will end up in landfills–and roads, and beaches, and streams. Refilling used plastic water bottles offers a number of safety risks; so just how are we supposed to responsibly quench our thirst on the go?

Plastic water bottles are non-returnable and since they are generally used away from the home they rarely see the inside of a recycling bin. Most water bottles are made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and have a lower recycling rate than any other common packaging materials, according to a report by the Container Recycling Institute (CRI). The quick solution many have adopted is simply refilling plastic water bottles from the tap—but alas, these bottles are not made or regulated for reuse and quite possibly don’t have the physical characteristics required to be safely reused.

Along with the possibility of bacterial contamination is the risk that PET is likely to leach some ugly little phthalates (known hormone disrupters) into your water. Harder polycarbonate (PET 7) bottles, like those used by hikers, can leach a known endocrine disruptive chemical, bisphenol-A (BPA), according to research published by the journal Current Biology.

Solution: Get yourself a nifty eco-friendly, safe, reusable water bottle. Look for one made from aluminum or stainless steel, inert materials that have 0.0 percent leaching. Fill it up with filtered water from your tap, and you’re good to go. Is it as convenient as buying a frosty plastic bottle of water when your thirst summons? No. But will it save you money, protect your health from leaching toxins, and make the planet a better place? Yes! So go ahead, quench in peace…

Sigg Swiss Engineered Water Bottles

Klean Kanteen