Why outlaw milk in a free country?

As I get older I am constantly amazed that people in society believe that it is government’s job to take care of us and make everything safe for us. They want to take care of our finances via Social Security (that very well may be bankrupt). They want to take care of our bad business decisions via bailouts (that have usurped money and power from the people into corporate interests). They want to keep us safe via engaging every country that refuses to become our ally (only to create more animosity around te world). They want to make sure we are healthy via giving us all “free” health care (which as my momma always said, “nothing is ever free,” which in turn means that in the end Obamacare will cost us dearly). They want to make sure that we are all cognizant via outlawing drugs (even the ones that have little to no scientific negative evidence such as marijuana, while promoting the BigPharma medicine that kills more people every year than car accidents).

But the one that makes me the most furious is that they control what we can eat via the Federal Drug Administration. For centuries people have eaten raw food out of the ground and from local animals with little to no issue. Make no mistake about it, people have gotten sick from such food but then again… people have got sick from processed food as well.

For a “land of the free” it seems plausible to believe that it’s government would believe that people should do as they please to themselves regardless of whether it is good or bad. Although, that isn’t the case in America.

I’ve always been interested in American government and what laws meant and why they were created. For the first time in history America vested all powers in the people. The only thing that the government did was what the people ceded to them. Anything that was unable to do by a citizen to their neighbor was unable to be ceded to the government to regulate or manage.

For years this is how it was.

Then the government started creating powers to regulate and manage what the citizens never even had rights to do. Citizens didn’t have the right to legislate what their neighbors did unless it imposed on their property. Nobody in their right mind would tell their neighbor that they couldn’t eat a steak or eggs because that would be absurd and rude. However today we do just that through the FDA. The FDA dictates what we can and cannot eat “for the better of society.”

I was browsing the WhiteHouse.Gov petition site. A petition was signed by 25k people asking the government why it didn’t allow us to drink raw milk (unpasteurized). This was their answer.

By Doug McKalip

Thank you for signing a petition about legalizing raw milk and for participating in the We the People platform on WhiteHouse.gov. We appreciate consumer concerns on food issues and understand the importance of letting consumers make their own food choices.

This Administration believes that food safety policy should be based on science. In this case, we support pasteurization to protect the safety of the milk supply because the health risks associated with raw milk are well documented.

Pasteurization of milk was adopted decades ago as a basic public health measure to kill dangerous bacteria and largely eliminate the risk of getting sick from one of the most important staples of the American diet. In 1987, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a regulation prohibiting the interstate sale of raw milk to reduce the number of illnesses and outbreaks associated with its consumption.

In recent years, some Americans have rejected pasteurization in favor of raw (or unpasteurized) milk, citing a range of taste, nutritional, and health benefits they believe are associated with raw milk consumption, as well as a general preference for unprocessed food.

As a science-based regulatory agency, the FDA looks to the scientific literature for information on benefits and risks associated with raw milk. While the nutritional and health benefits of raw milk consumption have not been scientifically substantiated, the health risks are clear. Since 1987, there have been 143 reported outbreaks of illness – some involving miscarriages, still births, kidney failure and deaths – associated with consumption of raw milk and raw milk products that were contaminated with pathogenic bacteria such as Listeria, Campylobacter, Salmonella, and E. coli. The FDA’s position on raw milk is in concert with the Center for Disease Control and the American Academy of Pediatricians.

The FDA does not regulate intrastate raw milk sales, or selling raw milk within a state, which is left up to the individual states. Today, 20 states explicitly prohibit the intrastate sale of raw milk in some form and 30 allow it. FDA bans interstate raw milk sales, or selling raw milk across state lines. The FDA has never taken, nor does it intend to take, enforcement action against an individual who purchases and transports raw milk across state lines solely for his or her own personal consumption.

Thank you for participating in this important process. We appreciate your opinions and look forward to hearing from you again soon.

Doug McKalip is Senior Policy Advisor for Rural Affairs in the White House Domestic Policy Council

Of course each state should be allowed the latitude to legalize (or not legalize) whatever they want. This is a right of a state. But why would the federal government not allow states to trade such an item such as raw milk? It seems ridiculous. But it really isn’t all that ridiculous because the FDA is a business – they control the market. It is no coincidence that the milk industry (the pasteurization type) lobbies the FDA vigorously. Why do you think the food pyramid is set up as it is even though there are studies that grains and pasteurized dairy is hard for our bodies to process?

I say, let us put what we want in our bodies. As an adult I should be afforded the ability to take chances as I see fit – one of them being raw milk.