Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. loves raw milk so much that he downed a shot of it at the White House last year while unveiling his Make America Healthy Again plan. Unsurprisingly, state lawmakers have since rushed to loosen regulations on unpasteurized dairy products.
Last month, Utah passed a law to increase the amount of raw milk producers can sell and ease testing requirements. Legislatures in Iowa, Oklahoma and Michigan are considering similar bills to expand access to these products.
It’s easy to respond to this movement with outrage. After all, it will almost certainly lead to more foodborne illnesses. Still, I think it’s important for public health leaders to take a more measured approach. While they should be clear about the risks of drinking raw milk, it simply is not on the same scale as Kennedy’s other catastrophic decisions, most notably upending long-standing vaccine policy.
Don’t get me wrong: The case against raw milk — euphemistically called “fresh milk” by aficionados — is strong. It can harbor bacteria that cause serious illness, including E. coli, salmonella, listeria and campylobacter. Pasteurization, a simple process that heats milk to at least 161 degrees Fahrenheit for about 15 seconds, kills these pathogens. Before pasteurization became standard practice, milk was a major source of infection for Americans and linked to as many as 1 in 4 cases of foodborne illness.
Raw milk enthusiasts argue that modern farming and sanitation practices make it safe to consume. But even farms that follow careful hygiene protocols can’t eliminate risk. Milk can be contaminated at multiple points in the production process, including from bacteria on the animal’s udder, in manure, in soil and water and on farm equipment. Contrary to some claims, labels such as “grass-fed” and “organic” do not render raw milk safe, and testing cannot guarantee that it is free from harmful germs across batches.
Between 1998 and 2018, 202 outbreaks involving more than 2,600 illnesses were linked to raw milk, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. This year, nine people in Idaho became seriously ill after consuming unpasteurized milk, including two children who developed a severe complication that can lead to kidney failure and death. In a separate outbreak, nine people contracted E. coli after consuming cheese made from a California farm’s raw milk. And in a third, a New Mexico infant died of a listeria infection, which health officials attributed to the child’s mother drinking unpasteurized milk during pregnancy.