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FDA Officials Crack Down On Dairy, Raw Milk Craze

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The Associated Press

Published: June 12, 2008

SAN FRANCISCO - Dairy owner Mark McAfee started selling raw milk in 2000, marketing it to customers who believe it contains beneficial microbes that treat everything from asthma to autism.

The unpasteurized milk swiftly caught on as part of the natural food movement. But the Food and Drug Administration considers McAfee a snake oil salesman and launched an investigation into whether his dairy illegally shipped raw milk across state lines.

The case against McAfee is part of a crackdown on raw milk by government health officials who are concerned about the spread of food-borne illnesses. Lawmakers and law enforcement agencies are stepping up efforts to keep unpasteurized milk out of reach, even as demand for the niche product grows.

McAfee, who was among the first in California to sell raw milk on a large scale, brushed off the investigation: "When you're a pioneer, you have to expect to take a few arrows."

Twenty-two states, including Florida, prohibit sales of raw milk for human consumption, and the rest allow it within their borders.

In Maryland, health officials issued a ban last year on "cow-sharing," claiming it aims at skirting a ban on raw milk.

"Raw milk should not be consumed by anyone for any reason," said John Sheehan, head of the FDA's dairy office. "It is an inherently dangerous product."

But shutting down sales is tricky because the federal government has largely let states regulate the raw milk industry.

Devotees of raw milk feed it to babies, saying it strengthens the immune system. The heat used in pasteurization, they say, kills healthful natural proteins and enzymes.

The FDA insists pasteurization destroys harmful bacteria without significantly changing milk's nutritional value.
Food safety officials say raw milk has sickened hundreds of people with salmonella, E. coli and other bacteria. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 1,000 people fell ill from raw milk between 1998 and 2005. Two died.

The FDA ban on cross-border sales of raw milk led to its criminal investigation of Organic Pastures, a Fresno dairy owned by McAfee that is California's largest raw milk supplier.

The agency ordered two of McAfee's employees to testify before a grand jury and offered to pay one of them to surreptitiously record her conversations with McAfee, according to the worker.

"The main issue was selling our products outside the state of California," said dairy worker Amanda Hall, who refused to wear the wire. The two workers' grand jury appearances were canceled last month.

Even if McAfee avoids criminal charges, he still faces lawsuits filed by the families of five children who claim his raw milk made them seriously ill.

He denies the allegations and said testing at his dairy did not detect the strain of E. coli that sickened some of the children.

Melissa Herzog, whose 10-year-old daughter spent two months in the hospital after her kidneys failed because of E. coli poisoning, is one of the families suing Organic Pastures over the 2006 outbreak.

"I don't have anything good to say about raw milk," she said. "It was a horrible experience."

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