Authors:
Dr. Ifeanyi Emmanuel Agu
Dr. Yetunde Morayo Oladipupo
Dr. Lubna Mirza, MD FACE
Last weekend, I had a merry band of friends visiting us in Oklahoma from out of state, think Lord of the Rings, but with more cargo shorts and fewer swords. Among them was a 22-year-old young man who had flown in all the way from the land of maple syrup and polite people, Canada.
Naturally, I asked him if he had any plans beyond the medieval festival we were attending (because nothing says “vacation” like watching grown adults joust in chainmail while eating overpriced turkey legs). He paused, eyes lighting up with the excitement of a kid.
“I’m going to a farm!” he exclaimed.
“A farm? What are you going to do there? Ride horses?” I asked, curious.
His eyes widened further, “I’m going to try unpasteurized milk. We can’t get it in Canada!”
I was… dumbfounded. Speechless. Flabbergasted. Since I was a kid, I always associated America with progress, with science, space, and technology. Of all the things someone could fly hundreds of miles to America for Disneyland, deep-fried Oreos, or watching a bald eagle do literally anything, this guy chose raw milk.
Listen, I never imagined that in my lifetime, I’d hear someone say, “I’m traveling to the United States where I will try milk that hasn’t been boiled enough to kill bacteria.” At that moment, I realized we weren’t just going to the medieval festival, we were living in the Middle Ages.
Let’s take a quick step back in time, Around the turn of the 1800s, the global population hovered around 1.8 billion. Fast forward to today: 8 billion and counting. How did we pull that off? No, it wasn’t because everyone suddenly started drinking unicorn-blessed raw milk. It was because of science, clean water, vaccines, antibiotics, insulin, iodized salt, vitamin D-enriched milk, and yes… pasteurization.
Before these innovations, people regularly died of preventable diseases. You could stub your toe and wake up in the afterlife (If there is one). Raw milk, in particular, is like a petri dish, it can harbor a collection of pathogens such as Salmonella, E. coli, Listeria, and more. Pasteurization is the simple, proven process of heating milk just enough to kill off the invisible buffet of germs, without turning it into radioactive material or “killing all its nutrients,” despite what your local conspiracy theorist might say.
Maybe the word “pasteurization” is confusing. The word is basically derived from the name of Louis Pasteur who lived in the 1800s. He discovered that there are tiny living beings that cause disease and we can kill them by heating up the milk. There was a time in history when doctors were punished for saying that the germs cause disease because people believed that the disease is the punishment from gods for bad deeds.
Now, raw milk lovers often claim it can cure lactose intolerance. Most of the world’s human population is lactose intolerant and we shouldn’t be drinking cow’s milk anyways but that’s not the point of this paper. Lactose is a natural sugar found in milk, roughly 4.8% in bovine milk. People with lactose intolerance lack the enzyme lactase to break it down. There’s no lactase hiding in raw milk waiting to save the day. All milk, raw or pasteurized, contains lactose.
“But what about probiotics?” they say, as they pour their raw milk into a mason jar with sage and good intentions. Sorry, folks. While fermented dairy products like yogurt can help with lactose digestion because they’re purposefully made with specific bacteria, raw milk does not contain those helpful microorganisms in the amounts needed. You’re not sipping on probiotic potion, you’re playing digestive roulette.
Honestly, it feels like we’ve failed to pass along the lessons of recent history. Young people today are so far removed from the days when a simple infection could wipe out a village, they think raw means better. They’re not learning from the wisdom of generations past; they want to make their own mistakes, now with branding.
I used to think America was the future, and the rest of the world would catch up. I didn’t think we’d start going backwards, like reverse time travel, but with worse hygiene.
So, to my Canadian friend: I hope the raw milk was everything you dreamed of, earthy, rebellious, and slightly risky. Just remember to keep your health insurance card close, as we do have a very expensive and difficult to navigate healthcare system… and maybe also a bottle of pasteurized Pepto.
