This is actually not the MOST PRESSING reason not to drink raw milk, but if it keeps people from doing it…
“California agriculture officials confirmed Sunday that avian influenza, or bird flu, was detected in raw milk produced by a Fresno County facility that sells its products at dozens of Bay Area grocery stores.”
https://www.sfchronicle.com/health/article/bird-flu-raw-milk-19940200.php
@feloneouscat It kinda blows my mind that people can be so stupid as to want raw milk.
In some ways it's even dumber (not nearly as damaging, just dumber) than antivax BS... at least vaccination is a relatively complex concept, and vaccine development/design is very complex, so ignorance & fear of the unknown is *somewhat* predictable.
Milk pasteurization, OTOH, is so simple (heat it up to a certain temp for a very short time to kill microorganisms) that fearing it is *completely inexcusable*.
Oh, it’s as dumb. These can kill you: Salmonella, E. coli and Listeria.
And they LOVE raw milk.
(Partner used to run a lab and a friend used to do milk testing for the FDA)
People think it’s “healthier”—you know the audience for raw cow’s milk? Baby cows.
It’s very weird that people think another species milk is better for them if it is raw.
@feloneouscat The main reason I say it's even dumber (as in, reflects more negatively on a person's intellect) is because it doesn't take anywhere near as much cognitive ability or background knowledge to understand pasteurization as it does vaccination.
The only prerequisites to understand pasteurization are a basic grasp of the germ theory of disease and the knowledge that heat can kill microbes.
Vaccination, OTOH, is much more complex & requires much more background knowledge to understand.