Raw Milk: Secret Superfood??

Summary

Science Vs – “Raw Milk: Secret Superfood??” (June 25, 2026)

Host: Wendy Zuckerman
Guest/Co-host: Blythe Terrell
Main Theme:
An investigation into the popular belief that raw (unpasteurized) milk is a “secret superfood.” The episode interrogates online health claims, explores the science behind raw milk’s purported benefits, and dissects the genuine risks, especially around allergies, gut health, and foodborne illness.

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Episode Overview

Wendy Zuckerman embarks on a tongue-in-cheek “illegal” mission to buy raw milk. Through interviews with experts and an exploration of key studies, she and colleague Blythe Terrell break down the major health claims associated with raw milk, compare them to current scientific consensus, and discuss the dangers versus any possible benefits. Peppered with the show’s characteristic humor and puns, the episode pulls apart whether raw milk is a miracle elixir or a risky fad.

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Key Discussion Points & Scientific Insights

1. What is Raw Milk & Why the Fuss?

[05:33 – 06:48]

• Definition: Raw milk is simply milk that has not been pasteurized (heated to kill potentially harmful bacteria).
• Accessibility & Legality: In many places (Australia, parts of the U.S.), it’s illegal or only sold as “pet food.” Wendy finds it hidden in the pet section of her local health food store.
• Cultural Popularity: Raw milk is championed by figures like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and is available in some European countries via vending machines.
• Central Question:

  “Could drinking raw milk be the thing you need to help your microbiome, your allergies, your asthma? Or are you gonna die from having too much diarrhea?” – Wendy Zuckerman [03:37]

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2. Raw Milk and the Microbiome

[08:01 – 12:06]

• Claim Debunked: Raw milk advocates say it has “gut-healthy” bacteria. Science says: not really.
• Expert Insight:
  • Prof. John Lucey (Food Scientist, University of Wisconsin–Madison):

  “There’s very little bugs of any description, good, bad, or indifferent in milk. That’s where the science is right now...the science isn’t supportive of it.” [09:20]

  • Fermented dairy (like yogurt) is where you find probiotic benefits, not from fresh milk.

  “If the milk had a million per gram of any bugs, it would already start to be sour.” – John Lucey [11:36]

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3. Allergies and Asthma: The ‘Farm Effect’

[12:06 – 24:05]

• Observational “Farm Effect”: Kids raised on farms appear to have dramatically lower rates of allergies and asthma.

  • e.g., Austrian study: 1% of farm kids vs. 4% of non-farm kids had asthma [14:05].

• Is it the Raw Milk?

  • Many online claims conflate the “farm effect” with drinking raw milk.
  • Actual studies are messy—farm kids might be drinking raw, boiled, or differently processed milk, and may have other environmental exposures.
  • In Europe, comparisons were often to “ultra-pasteurized” shelf-stable milk, not standard U.S. pasteurized milk, muddying results.
  • Definition Breakdowns:

  “What a lot of people seem to get wrong about these studies...they’re assuming that, like, farm milk is raw milk. But if you actually read the nitty gritty papers, you see, sometimes that’s not true.” – Blythe Terrell [17:47]

• Expert Caution:

  • Dr. Christine Surughi (Pediatric Allergist):

  “She thinks we shouldn’t be lapping up the science out of Europe and using it to bolster claims that raw milk is good for you.” – Blythe Terrell [18:48]

Digging Deeper: Amish, Mennonites & The Hygiene Hypothesis

[20:13 – 23:32]

• Research with Amish and Old Order Mennonites:

  • Both groups drink farm-fresh/raw milk, but Amish tend to have much lower rates of allergic disease than the Mennonites.
  • Possible Explanation: Amish are much more involved in hands-on animal husbandry, exposing themselves (and their children, sometimes in utero) to farm microbes—not just the milk.

  “It’s not about drinking the raw milk. It’s about all that time with the animals.” – Wendy Zuckerman [21:53]

• Practical Takeaway:

  • Early exposure to diverse environmental microbes, especially in infancy (even prenatally), appears to reduce allergy/asthma risk—not raw milk specifically.
  • Related advice: “Get a pet, get a dog...that also is a good way for your kid to be exposed to this type of stuff early in life.” – Blythe Terrell [24:00]

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4. The Real Risks: Foodborne Illness from Raw Milk

[28:26 – 38:33]

• Expert Warnings:

  • Contamination Risk: Even with healthy cows and attempts at cleanliness, the environment is not sterile:

    “You try and keep it as clean as you can...but to think that the ground or the soil or the bedding that the animal is laying down in is sterile is just fantasy.” – John Lucey [29:41] “And remember, this is a sensitive area for the cow, too, so you can’t spend five minutes...scrubbing.” – John Lucey [30:45]

• Common Culprits:

  • Salmonella, E. coli, Campylobacter, Listeria (esp. dangerous for immunocompromised and pregnant people)
  • 90% of sampled cows had Listeria in their feces (WI farm study) [32:09]
  • Roughly 5% of bulk tanks are contaminated with listeria or other pathogens, but when looking for “any pathogen,” up to 20–30% of raw milk tanks are contaminated [33:11, 33:36]

  “At the upper estimate of 30% in the bulk tanks...Why would you give that to your pet or your kid?” – Blythe Terrell [34:07]

• Raw Milk in Stores:

  • UK study found 40% of retail raw milk samples had risky pathogens [34:13]

How Many Get Sick?

• CDC Data:

  • In 20 years, over 2,600 people sickened in the US in 200+ raw milk–linked outbreaks [34:51].
  • Not as common as illness from seafood or leafy greens, but more dangerous to kids:

    “Children end up being the most largest percentage of hospitalizations for raw milk outbreaks...sometimes it’s like a quarter or more are sometimes under the age of 3 and 5 years old.” – John Lucey [35:51]

  • Tragic real-world impact: Recent listeria case in New Mexico resulted in a miscarriage [36:44]

• Relative Risk:

  • Pasteurized milk can also become contaminated, but “when people were getting sick from contaminated dairy, 96% of the time it was the raw stuff.” – Blythe Terrell [38:12]

Is Safe Raw Milk Possible?

“Is there a way to have safe raw milk? ...No. It’s a foolish and risky thing to do.” – John Lucey [39:10]

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5. Conclusion & Takeaways

[39:50 – End]

• Pasteurization Works:

  “Pasteurization works really well to kill all the stuff that we are talking about.” – Blythe Terrell [38:28]
  “Pasteurized milk is one of the safest food products on the planet.” – John Lucey [39:04]

• Key Message:
  There is little credible evidence that raw milk has unique health benefits—certainly not for allergies, asthma, or gut health—and significant evidence that it carries much higher risk of foodborne illness, which can result in serious health effects, especially in children and pregnant women.

• Wendy’s Final Verdict:
  The raw milk goes… not to the cat, not to herself, but probably down the drain.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On likelihood of raw milk helping your health:

  “You can’t just, like, sprinkle in a few things and expect to, like, fix your gut.” – Blythe Terrell [11:22]

• On the hygiene hypothesis:

  “If you have, like, a mechanical milking setup…you’re just not up in it with the animals nearly as much.” – Blythe Terrell [22:07]

• On the real dangers:

  “Some people keep trying to act like drinking raw milk is unlocking some secret level of health. Well, I want to say congratulations. It unlocked diarrhea, fever, stomach cramps, nausea, and vomiting.” – (Humorous voiceover) [03:16]

• On the futility of “safe” raw milk:

  “No. It’s a foolish and risky thing to do.” – John Lucey [39:10]

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Timestamps of Key Segments

• 00:00–04:20 – Wendy’s “illegal” raw milk mission/setup
• 05:32–06:48 – Legal gray area and accessibility of raw milk
• 08:01–12:06 – Microbiome/probiotics discussion (with John Lucey)
• 12:06–24:05 – Allergies, asthma, “farm effect,” and Amish/Mennonite studies
• 28:26–38:33 – Raw milk contamination, pathogen risks, and outbreak data (with John Lucey & Christine Surughi)
• 38:33–40:12 – Is safe raw milk possible? Final verdict
• 40:33–41:09 – Citations and show updates

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Final Science Vs Judgement

Raw milk is NOT a secret superfood. The potential risks, especially of serious infection, far outweigh any evidence of real benefits for gut health or allergies. Pasteurization is a tested, proven public health success—don’t skip it.

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For further references and full citations (all 72!), check the transcript linked in the show notes.

Transcript

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and this is Science Versus. After this episode, we're taking a quick break just to work on some future episodes. So if you have ideas, let us know in the comments things you'd like us to verses. And we wanted to let you know that we now have a YouTube channel. Yay, it's science vspodcast. There's a link in the show notes. You could also catch us on Instagram TikTok. But now it's time for the episode. Let's jump in. I'm on an illegal mission today. Legal gray area would be more accurate, but for a cold open like this, we're gonna say illegal. No, we're gonna say gray area. There's no way that would get through. Fact checked. The point is, I'm doing something naughty. A couple of weeks ago, I went on a secret mission. Okay, here I go. I'm going into the store. There's plants out the front, plants inside. Organic bananas to my left. I'm here to buy something that some say is dangerous and could even kill me. The chocolate milk drops. I bet there's carob somewhere around here. God only knows.

[Blythe Terrell]

Oh, my gosh.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

There's an empty. It's a completely empty fridge. Oh, there's one left. One left. I found it. It's a white substance in a plastic bottle. There's one left.

[Blythe Terrell]

There's one left.

[Advertisement Voice]

One.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Raw milk. Raw milk. I've got it.

[Blythe Terrell]

I've got it.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I've got it.

[Doug]

Hello. Hi.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

But should I drink it? Thank you, Nic.

[Advertisement Voice]

Yes, please.

[John Lucey]

Sure.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

A lot of people online are saying, yes, that this milk that I've got that hasn't been pasteurized and is straight from the teat has heaps of benefits. They say, just look at the science.

[Blythe Terrell]

Raw milk, raw dairy in your diet is definitely going to improve your health.

[John Lucey]

Raw milk protects kids from asthma, eczema and allergies.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

It is packed full of gut, healthy bacteria. You heal your microbiome.

[Blythe Terrell]

God intended milk to be raw. If he didn't, he would have put a pasteurization chamber on the udder of a cow.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Raw milk fandom has even hit the udder echelons of society. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Is a huge raw milk fan. And it's not just the RFK juniors of the world. It's pretty common to drink raw milk in some countries. You can even find it in some vending machines around Europe. But of course, there is a flip side to this story. The raw milk naysayers who reckon that raw Milk is dangerous. It's actually illegal to sell raw milk for humans to drink in Australia and in some states in the US as well. I had to find it in the pet food section of the store. So why are people worried here?

[Advertisement Voice]

Some people keep trying to act like drinking raw milk is unlocking some secret level of health. Well, I want to say congratulations. It unlocked diarrhea, fever, stomach cramps, nausea, and vomiting.

The only reason to drink raw milk

[Blythe Terrell]

is if you ever wondered, hey, I

[Advertisement Voice]

wonder what it's like to die from having too much diarrhea.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So who's right here? Could drinking raw milk be the thing you need to help your microbiome, your allergies, your asthma? Or are you gonna die from having too much diarrhea? Today on the show, we're gonna squeeze the teat of science until we've filled our bucket with facts around raw milk. Because, you know, there's a lot of

[Blythe Terrell]

God intended milk to be raw.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

And then there's science. Science versus raw milk is coming up just after the break.

[Advertisement Voice]

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[Blythe Terrell]

There's a killer on the loose.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Brooke Shields leads an all star cast in the hit original mystery series. You're killing me.

[Blythe Terrell]

I solve mysteries for a living.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I think I'm good to go.

[Blythe Terrell]

Maybe in one of your books, not in real life.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Catch every killer episode.

[Blythe Terrell]

You're someone who can vouch for your whereabouts at the time it begins here.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

What are you, the Alibi police?

[Blythe Terrell]

That's literally who I am.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Exactly who I am. You're killing me. All episodes now streaming on Acorn tv. Welcome back. Today we are guzzling down the science of raw milk. And I'm here with our editor, Blythe Terrell. Hello, Blythe.

[Blythe Terrell]

Hello, Wendy.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So I've got it in my hot little hands.

[Blythe Terrell]

Ooh, I'm so nervous.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Um, it's. I should say so. It says pet milk only. And what's funny about the health food store that I bought it at is. So you go to the milk section with the. The regular pasteurized milk, and then they have a sign that says, if you want raw milk, Go to the pet food section. But there is no other pet food sold in the quote unquote pet food section. Across the store, there's just a fridge with raw milk. And that's it.

[Blythe Terrell]

Wow, that is cheeky. Yeah.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay, so let's open. Let's open this raw milk.

[Blythe Terrell]

Once it's open. It's open, Wendy. Then it really becomes like Chekhov's raw milk.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah. Okay, here we go. There it is.

[Blythe Terrell]

So you're just gonna put it there next to you, Right. You're not having it now?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Nope. The question is, Blythe, am I gonna drink this?

[Blythe Terrell]

It sounds like maybe you need some science before you can make that call.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I believe so. So tell me, Blad, let's start here. What is different about this raw milk compared to regular milk that you would buy at the store?

[Blythe Terrell]

Okay. So the key difference is that it has not been pasteurized. Right. And I can tell you a little bit about pasteurization.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Thank you.

[Blythe Terrell]

So what we do when we pasteurize milk is basically we heat it up, usually to 161 degrees Fahrenheit, 72 degrees Celsius.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Thank you.

[Blythe Terrell]

For you and those like you for like, 15 seconds or less. And when we started doing this at scale, it was about 100 years ago.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay.

[Blythe Terrell]

And that, Wendy, was partly because milk was making people sick actually a lot of the time with things like tuberculosis. Like, the cows would get tuberculosis.

[Advertisement Voice]

Oh.

[Blythe Terrell]

And, like, it would come out in their milk, and people would drink the milk and get tb.

[Doug]

Wow.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Oh, I didn't realize.

[Blythe Terrell]

Tb.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay. So they start pasteurizing the milk and works.

[Blythe Terrell]

It kills the bus, kills the TB.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes.

[Blythe Terrell]

It becomes the thing we do in the U.S. right. And a lot of other places.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

And so I guess now the movement is saying we're killing too much in the mill.

[Doug]

Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

Perhaps it's overkill. Mm.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Overkill.

[Blythe Terrell]

Like, a big argument is that we're getting rid of microbes that actually, like, would make our guts stronger if they hung around.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Right. We're getting rid of the bad microbes and the good.

[Blythe Terrell]

And that's where I want to start with this argument about the microbiome. And so to find out if that is true, I called up this guy in the dairy capital of the United States.

[John Lucey]

My name is John Lucey. I'm a professor in the Food Science Department here at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and I'm also the director of our Centre for Dairy Research.

[Blythe Terrell]

And that is not all. John is from Ireland. And also I grew up on a

[John Lucey]

farm, too, so a dairy farm.

[Doug]

As well.

[Christine Surughi]

So.

[John Lucey]

And I also worked for a couple of years in New Zealand, another dairy country.

[Blythe Terrell]

So, Wendy, I brought you the Dairy King.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah, he's perfect. He's perfect.

[Blythe Terrell]

And so I asked John about this argument that raw milk is good for your gut, that it's kind of a probiotic, basically. Yeah. And so John told me out of the gate that there is a really good reason to be skeptical of this. And it comes down to the fact that generally, if you've got a healthy cow, the milk doesn't pop out of the teat chock full of bacteria.

[John Lucey]

There's very little bugs of any description, good, bad, or indifferent in milk. That's where the science is right now, is not that there's a really important good bacteria flora in the raw milk. That's just not where we're at right now, that just the science isn't supportive of it.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's interesting, though, because it definitely suggests that this raw milk in front of me isn't that dangerous. Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

We're gonna get into the details of that later.

[Doug]

Mm.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay.

[Blythe Terrell]

But, like, basically, the scientists tend to agree that when it comes out initially, like, it doesn't really have a bunch of bacteria in it. And this actually makes intuitive sense because if you think about, like, the dairy that we eat that we know has good probiotic stuff in it, like yogurt, that stuff is fermented, which means that you've added that bacteria to it.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Of course, you're thinking about yogurt, kefir, things like that.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah. And even if there were, like, a tiny bit of good gut bugs for the microbiome.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah.

[Blythe Terrell]

It wouldn't be there in the amount that it would need to be in order to actually do anything inside your gut.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah.

[Blythe Terrell]

Because for a probiotic to work, scientists generally think that, like, it has to have a lot of. Of these bugs. Here is John on that.

[John Lucey]

So if you, like, buy a probiotic supplement and you look at the fine print, they'll say it contains program millions and billions and whatever of bucks. And because numbers are important for these benefits, it's not like, because your own gut microbiome is in the bazillions, you know, off the chart.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

The analogy that I always hear from researchers talking about the microbiome is that if you imagine your gut like a rainforest and then you drink some milk and say it's like a pigeon comes in to the rainforest, it's not gonna. It's not gonna change things. It's not gonna flourish.

[Blythe Terrell]

Right, right.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That space is taken.

[Advertisement Voice]

Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

Well, exactly. So you can't just, like, sprinkle in a few things and expect to, like, fix your. Your.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Literally.

[Blythe Terrell]

Literally. So John actually told me that to do the kind of thing that people are claiming that the milk could do,

[John Lucey]

the milk would need a million per gram of bugs. And if the milk had a million per gram of any bugs, it would already start to be sour.

[Christine Surughi]

Oh.

[Blythe Terrell]

Of anything.

[John Lucey]

Anything.

[Blythe Terrell]

So to me, this. This is what makes the microbiome claim fall pretty flat. Like, it does not make me want to go running to the local farm for a warm, frothy glass fresh from the ud.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

All right, so the next claim let's look up is this idea that it can prevent allergies and asthma.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yes.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Anything to this.

[Blythe Terrell]

This one, Wendy, is like, a lot more interesting, actually.

[Advertisement Voice]

Ooh.

[Blythe Terrell]

This is the one that made me go, hmm. All right. Can you hear this intrigue?

[Narrator/Announcer]

Hit it.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Fly.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah. Yes. This is a big one that people say, right? They say that if you give kids raw milk, it can help prevent allergy, it can help prevent asthma. And actually, if raw milk could do this, it would actually be a pretty big deal because these conditions, asthma and allergies, they're super common in kids. I talked about this with Professor Christine Surughi. She's a pediatric allergist and immunologist who's also at the University of Wisconsin. And she says asthma can be really serious.

[Christine Surughi]

It is the number one reason for admission to the hospital for a child. Asthma, Asthma and wheat.

[Blythe Terrell]

Really the number one reason.

[Christine Surughi]

Exactly. And so if you can prevent it in the first place from developing, that's game changing.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah. And we've seen a rise in allergies and asthma in kids, right?

[Blythe Terrell]

Yes. And that's what she pointed out too, is that, like, in a lot of countries, these numbers are going up. So this all is connected to raw milk because a couple of decades ago, we started getting studies relating to asthma and allergies in this particular group, kids who live on farms. So what these studies would do is that a lot of times there were these big surveys coming out of Europe and they would look at thousands of kids comparing the health of the farm kids, medical conditions they had to kids who didn't live on the farm. And what they found was really striking

[Christine Surughi]

epidemiologic evidence that the children growing up on farms are really protected from developing allergic diseases. Some people say the farm effect.

[Blythe Terrell]

One study out of Austria found that about 1% of the farm kids had asthma, compared to about 4% of kids who didn't live on the farm. You know, A study out of Germany found that just over 3% of farm kids had asthma compared to more than 6% of non farm kids. Yeah, and allergies and asthma, it's like skin conditions, stuff like eczema, these histamine things. Yeah. And Christine told me this finding, it's been borne out in the US as well.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I feel like this story of kids on farms having low allergies, it's sort of, I feel like the science has known this for a while, but it's had in the past been attributed to the hygiene hypothesis and that maybe these kids on farms are exposed to more dirt and that's really good for them and lowering their risk of, of getting these illnesses. Is now the thought moving. Maybe it's because they're drinking raw milk.

[Blythe Terrell]

You have entered the ring on this debate, Wendy.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So Jonna, walk me through. So with the hygiene hypothesis, let's bing,

[Blythe Terrell]

bing, bing, bing, bing.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So, okay, okay, so what is the up to date thinking on that?

[Blythe Terrell]

The up to date thinking is that, yes, like these exposures to things on the farm to like dust, to dander, all these things that challenge your immune system at a really young age and sort of teach your immune system like what's out in the world and basically strengthens it so that like when it encounters that stuff later, you don't have a big allergic reaction to it. The idea is still that that's important. But at the same time, some scientists have also looked closer and started to think that maybe also the milk that these farm kids are drinking is at play.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay.

[Blythe Terrell]

And some of these, particularly some of these researchers out of Europe started thinking this because they looked at these, they did these big observational studies of a lot of kids and they tried to look at kids who were in some cases not living on the farm, but who are drinking raw milk. And they tried to control for some of those other exposures on the farm. And they have started to say, we think that there is something going on with the milk. Like we don't. We think that the hygiene hypothesis is part of this, but we also think that the milk is at play.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

This will just show my ignorance. Living on a farm, growing up on a farm, these kids aren't drinking raw milk. I feel like we're making some assumptions here. I'm guessing the researchers actually are saying these families.

[Blythe Terrell]

Wendy, you're such a good student of the challenges of this research. How did you know?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Wait, is this an actual question?

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah. Yeah, it is. So it is not always clear that the stuff that the kids are drinking on the farm is strictly raw milk. Because some of the time, even if kids are drinking milk from the farm, it's getting boiled, it's getting treated some kind of way, and the studies don't always check for that. And then on top of that, some of these studies coming out of Europe are comparing this farm milk to milk that has gone way beyond sort of standard pasteurization. So this is stuff that, like, has been heated up way higher to a way higher temperature. And that kind of milk is more common in Europe. It's actually like the milk that you get that you don't have to put in the fridge, like the shelf stable stuff.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Oh, like the crap you get on a plane.

[Doug]

Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

Like the sterilized.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's sitting in a hotel room in a little box. That sort of stuff.

[Blythe Terrell]

Exactly. That can just sit on the shelf for three months or whatever without being refrigerated.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Oh, so you compare it to that, which is seriously processed milk.

[Blythe Terrell]

Right. And so online, this is what a lot of people seem to get wrong about these studies. You know, they're assuming that, like, farm milk is raw milk.

[Narrator/Announcer]

And.

[Blythe Terrell]

But if you actually read the nitty gritty papers, you see, sometimes that's not true. And sometimes what they're looking at is something else. Wendy called, quote, minimally processed milk. You wanna know what that is?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah. Minimally processed milk. What's that?

[Blythe Terrell]

So that is pasteurized milk.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's that. Science versus Touch Blythe. Getting into the papers, working out what all the definitions are.

[Blythe Terrell]

That's right. We love a definition.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's why we're here.

[Blythe Terrell]

And so I will say, despite all that, scientists like Christine, they are not, like, driving a nail through the coffin of this claim that raw milk might do something to help reduce allergies.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So when she looks at all this complexity, she's like, I'm not crying over spilt milk. Correct.

[Blythe Terrell]

Christine does not.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

She doesn't think the science is spoiled.

[Blythe Terrell]

She thinks we shouldn't be lapping up the science out of Europe and using it to bolster claims that raw milk is good for you.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

But she doesn't think we're ready for a milk shakeup and that we should all be drinking raw milk right now.

[Blythe Terrell]

She does not think that.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So we've done our puns. Where do we go from here then?

[Blythe Terrell]

Well, I'm not gonna leave you with just that. Okay, okay.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Because it would behoove me to tell me more.

[Blythe Terrell]

Sorry, sorry, sorry. I can squeeze out a few more drops of science.

[Advertisement Voice]

Just.

[Blythe Terrell]

Okay, okay.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

We've really. Milked this for all it's worth.

[Blythe Terrell]

Oh, my God. I'm. Put my dipper back into the pail, Wendy, and pull out more science for you.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay.

[Blythe Terrell]

So Christine actually was part of a study that I did think does some work here to help us parse out how big of a deal raw milk might be. Like, if there's a signal, how much might that matter compared to, like, the other stuff people are exposed to on the farm. Right. And so Christine is based in Wisconsin, and she works with a lot of people. She. She studies a lot of different families who live on farms. And what she did is some research into these two particular groups in the US The Amish and the Old Order Mennonites. Are you familiar?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah, I've been to Pennsylvania Intercourse. Big Amish community there. My parents laughed a lot at the name. I didn't understand why it was funny. I do now. Tell me more.

[Blythe Terrell]

So, yes. So the Amish and the Old Order Mennonites are similar in a lot of ways. They often have big families. They live these sort of more traditional farming lifestyles, not big on technology a lot of the time. And they tend to drink raw milk.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay, great.

[Blythe Terrell]

Raw milk from the farm.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes, great.

[Blythe Terrell]

Raw milk. Perfect. Yes.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes.

[Blythe Terrell]

But these two groups are different in one important way. So the Amish often don't use any electricity at all. And the Mennonites, some of them do have electricity, so they tend to sometimes use mechanized processes for things. So Christine's team, what they did, is that they surveyed a bunch of families in these two groups. They looked at the rates of asthma, the rates of allergy, and they found

[Christine Surughi]

the Amish community is, like, super protected. Like, they had decreased allergic diseases across the board compared to the Old Order Mennonites.

[Blythe Terrell]

This might suggest that what matters here is that they're doing all this stuff by hand with the animals, so that animal contact is what's important. So what you see in, like, an Amish family, and I'm speaking generally here. Right. Is that people are in the barn. You know, they're like, one on one. They're milking the cows by hand. They're in the cowshed.

[Doug]

Mm.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

It's not about drinking the raw milk. It's about all that time with the animals.

[Blythe Terrell]

That is a suggestion that the time with the animals could be more important.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Which is back to the hygiene hypothesis. That's bing, bing, bing.

[Blythe Terrell]

Exactly.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Hygiene hypothesis.

[Blythe Terrell]

Bing, bing, bing. Yes, yes. Another scientist told me that in Amish households, a lot of times it's the women who are doing the milking. So they're in the barns a lot, including when they're pregnant, maybe including when they have really small babies, you know, and that the kids are involved. And so there's like just a lot of exposure, one on one with animals that if you have like a mechanical milking setup or like a more mechanized farm, you're on the tractors, all this stuff, you're just like not up in it with the animals nearly as much.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Got it.

[Blythe Terrell]

And the thinking is that that might be. We don't know for sure, but that might be the bigger difference maker here. So, like, even away from the Amish and the Mennonites, just sort of bigger picture. You know, Christine's group, they study a lot of farming families in Wisconsin. And they will ask them, you know,

[Christine Surughi]

is the child going into the barn and if so, at what age? I mean, that makes a difference. And getting exposed to that barn environment in the stable, like that is another protective signal.

[Blythe Terrell]

At what age is it most beneficial for the kid to be in the barn?

[Christine Surughi]

Yeah, I mean, it's a good question. The data from the epidemiologic studies strongly suggests that this needs to happen early in life. In the European, studies have suggested that even begins in utero.

[Doug]

Aha.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So actually what we need to be doing is taking our kids to the farm or going to farms when pregnant to reduce the risk of allergies and asthma. That's where we're at.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah. Which is sort of a little bit of an annoying answer. Right, like, because not everybody has access to that kind of thing. But the other thing Christine told me is that, like, get a pet, get a dog, like that also is a good way for your kid to be exposed to this type of stuff early in life.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So where we're at with the research at the moment, this raw milk in front of me, not packed with good bacteria and probably not gonna be the thing to help me with my allergies or reduce your kids chance of having eczema, allergies and asthma in the future. Is that where we're at?

[Blythe Terrell]

I think that's right. You know, it's possible there's some kind of link with allergies and asthma. Not really a slam dunk. Okay. How are you feeling about the idea of taking a big old gulp of that?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I mean, less interested than when we started, I've gotta say. But I'm also less worried about it because John said there's probably not that many bad bugs in here, but is that.

[Blythe Terrell]

I'm gonna have to stop you right there. Okay, let's talk about that after the break.

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[Narrator/Announcer]

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[Doug]

I'm out. Let's go.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

All right, welcome back.

[Blythe Terrell]

I'm here with Blythe.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

We are suckling at the teat of raw milk. Research.

[Blythe Terrell]

Absolutely. Yes, we are.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay, so now we are onto the risks. How dangerous is this glass of milk in front of me? Cause I am getting thirsty, Blythe.

[Blythe Terrell]

Oh, no. My time is running out.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I'm parched. I'm parched.

[Blythe Terrell]

Right. Okay. Let me tell you, even though, like John said, the milk doesn't start out with a bunch of bugs in it, if the cow is healthy. Of course, sometimes the cow is not healthy, and gnarly stuff can get into the milk that way. So, actually, astute listeners of the show will remember from our bird flu episode that cows can get bird flu and that can get into their milk.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes, that's right.

[Blythe Terrell]

But even if the cow is healthy, you have something else to worry about. Because the other big concern is that even if the milk comes out okay, it can get contaminated afterward. Bugs can get in because cows are on farms, and the milk comes out of their udders, which are just kind of like flopping around under their bodies.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

It's also somewhat close to their butthole, right? I guess.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yes. Near the poop chute.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes.

[Blythe Terrell]

So they can come into contact with all sorts of stuff. And I dug into this with John Lucey, who's the first scientist that we heard from.

[John Lucey]

You know, I grew up in a farm. We do the best we can, but you try and keep it as clean as you can. But to think that the ground or the soil or the bedding that the animal is laying down in is sterile is just fantasy. And the problem is the dairy farms are just not a sterile environment.

[Blythe Terrell]

Right. The cow's not in a bubble.

[John Lucey]

Cow's not in a bubble. The soil is not in the bubble. The feed is not in the bubble.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's fascinating. So it comes out, let's say, close to sterile, but as soon as it's out, then it's exposed to all of these other things. And that stuff that can then infect the milk, that tends to be the bad bacteria. Is that right?

[Blythe Terrell]

Yes, exactly. Like that's what we, that's what we see. It's a dirty environment because there's dirt, you know, and actually one thing that John told me that was also kind of interesting is that if this bacteria gets on the teat of the cow, somehow sometimes it just like hangs out there.

[John Lucey]

We all see these hospital shows and we see the doctor about to go into the surgery and he's washing his hands and it's not a five second job, it's like scrubbing of the hands. Scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing. Why? Because on the hands they can be bacteria and it can form actually biofilms on the hands and in the environment. And that means it's harder to remove than just a simple little wash off. The same can be true on the outside of these other of the teats, that they can actually be permanent bacteria living on the outside of it that are very hard to remove. And remember, this is a sensitive area for the cow too, so you can't spend five minutes like the doctor scrubbing.

[Blythe Terrell]

And the things we're worried about here are stuff like Salmonella, E. Coli, this thing called Campylobacter, and in particular, I want to zoom in on one bacteria, Listeria. So there's a bunch of different types of Listeria, but one of them in particular can make us pretty sick and it can cause gross stuff like diarrhea and nausea. But it's actually especially dangerous to people with compromised immune systems. And if you're pregnant, it can kill the baby. And listeria is kind of all over the farm. You can find it in the soil, you can find it in the cows a lot of the time, at least in their crap. Here's John again.

[John Lucey]

I'll give you just an example. One of my colleagues here at the University of Wisconsin did a study of a farm here in Wisconsin, and she literally went out and sampled poop from these animals and cows. 90% of the animals were carrying Listeria monocytogens.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

So that's in their poo, though. So then the question is, how often is that listeria, any of these scary bugs going from the farm to the milk? Right, right. That's the question.

[Blythe Terrell]

That is the question. Yeah, yeah, that is the question. How often is this grotty stuff actually getting into the milk?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes, yes.

[Blythe Terrell]

And so one way that scientists try to figure this out is that they look at the milk at the dairy because it comes out of the cows. It all gets collected up before it gets pasteurized.

[Doug]

Right?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yeah.

[Blythe Terrell]

And what happens is it gets collected in this big tank called a bulk tank.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay.

[Blythe Terrell]

And scientists, what they'll do is they'll take samples from a bun of tanks and they'll actually analyze them to see what's in there.

[John Lucey]

I would say, you know, if you look at the percentage of the different pathogens, sometimes you see 5% of them are contaminated with listeria. 5% are contaminated, roughly. I'm giving broad ranges with Campylobacter, E. Coli, et cetera.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah. So when they look at these samples, about 1 in 20 of them have one of these nasty bacteria inside them.

[John Lucey]

But if you amalgamate. Alderman, you ask a slightly different question, John. How many bulk tanks in many of these surveys have at least one pathogen? Sometimes it's as high as 20 to 30% have one pathogen present in the bulk tank.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Whoa, whoa. There's no way I'm drinking that.

[Blythe Terrell]

You don't like those odds?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

No way. At the upper estimate of 30% in the bulk tanks.

[Blythe Terrell]

Whoa.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

And why would you give that to

[Blythe Terrell]

your pet or your kid? Wendy?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

So, I mean, the bottom line is, like, it's pretty common to find creepy stuff in the milk. Like, John talked about those numbers. I found a study out of the UK that looked at raw milk that was actually for sale. And it found that 40% of the samples they looked at had some kind of raw problem with a risky pathogen.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

But then. 40. Right. But then not everyone who will then drink these microbes in their raw milk will then get sick.

[Advertisement Voice]

Right.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Some of them, their immune system will deal with it. So how often are people getting sick from drinking raw milk?

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah, I mean, it's a great question, you know, Cause like, look, some people drink raw milk and they are totally fine. You know, it's not like they're drinking arsenic. Right. But there have definitely been some disease outbreaks. So this one CDC study looked at about a 20 year period and found more than 200 outbreaks tied to raw milk in the US getting about 2,600 people sick just this year. There have been a couple of outbreaks in the headlines. There was an E. Coli outbreak that was linked to this raw cheese in Idaho. Almost 60 people got sick from raw milk. A bunch of them from Campylobacter. And look, when you look at the raw numbers, Wendy.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Yes. Nice.

[Blythe Terrell]

People are more likely to get sick from other foods. Stuff like seafood, maybe leafy vegetables like spinach. That is true. But with raw milk, what freaks out scientists like John is that a lot of the time with these outbreaks, the people who get sick are kids.

[John Lucey]

Children end up being the most largest percentage of Hospitalizations for raw milk outbreaks, they don't have a choice. They don't have anything they've been for. Mom and dad are feeding it to their kids. Those are the ones that I get most concerned about. And depending on which study you take, sometimes it's like a quarter or more are sometimes under the age of 3 and 5 years old. People are thinking, oh, I gotta expose my kids to pathogens. Are you serious? They could end up in hospital. That's the problem.

[Blythe Terrell]

And earlier this year, this is actually how raw milk kind of got on my radar because there was a listeria case. So this woman in New Mexico apparently drank raw milk during her pregnancy and

[Wendy Zuckerman]

she lost her baby because of a listeria infection. She had a listeria infection?

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Oh, God.

[Blythe Terrell]

So, like, not common from what we can tell. But these outbreaks, when they happen, people can die.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I mean, this is exactly why it's so devastating. Right? I mean, I don't know what was happening for this woman during her pregnancy, but more broadly, you see these trends and these influences and people saying, damn the establishment. What do they know? Raw milk is the answer. Pasteurization is a farce. And then this is the ultimate conclusion. Of course it is. Then people thinking, oh, I've gotta be drinking raw milk to help my unborn child and reduce the chance of them getting allergies. And then they're missing the bigger picture.

[Blythe Terrell]

That is listeria. Right. And the stakes are just really high because it's not common for those horrible, horrible things to happen, but when they do, it's awful. They're awful. Yeah, yeah.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I just wanna, just, just wanna spill that milk right in front of me. But just coppet. I don't, I don't wanna have to clean that. So, I mean, it's really feeling like this raw milk, raw milk's not coming back from that, right?

[Blythe Terrell]

No, I don't think so. And I mean, you know, just to say, like some raw milk producers, of course they'll say like, listen, we try to avoid this. We keep things clean, we try to test for bacteria. And also, like, there are instances where stuff sneaks into pasteurized milk and makes you sick.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Right.

[Blythe Terrell]

But one study found that when people were getting sick from contaminated dairy, 96% of the time it was the raw stuff.

[Narrator/Announcer]

Wow.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 96% of the time, which is why we pasteurize it.

[Blythe Terrell]

Pasteurization works really well to kill all the stuff that we are talking about.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

You had it fast in 20, 26,

[Blythe Terrell]

100 plus years later, pasteurization works. Really? Well, yeah.

[Advertisement Voice]

Yeah.

[Blythe Terrell]

I mean, listen, John was like, it's good that we've been doing it so long, you know, like, it's allowed us to, like, test it and refine it and figure out systems for it, figure out how to do it at scale.

[John Lucey]

And all of that has been put in place over a hundred years to show that pasteurized milk is one of the safest food products on the planet.

[Blythe Terrell]

So I asked him, is there a way to have safe raw milk? You're shaking your head no.

[John Lucey]

No. It's a foolish and risky thing to do.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I don't want to be called foolish by John.

[Christine Surughi]

So

[Blythe Terrell]

what are you going to do with that milk?

[Wendy Zuckerman]

I mean, there's this annoying neighborhood cat.

[Blythe Terrell]

Wendy, no.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That might be thirsty and pisses on my security gate.

[Blythe Terrell]

If you even don't do it, it

[Wendy Zuckerman]

says pet milk only.

[Blythe Terrell]

Oh, my God, Wendy. Throw it out. Put it down the drain.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Tell us in the comments, what should I do with the raw milk?

[Blythe Terrell]

Oh, my God. Yeah, I think they'll tell you exact where you can put it. Wendy,

[Wendy Zuckerman]

That's science verses. I'm not gonna give it to the cat. Don't call Peter. I know you would never put down the phone. Don't call Peter. It's fine. How many citations are in this week's episode?

[Blythe Terrell]

There are 72 citations in this week's episode.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

And if people want to see them, where should they go?

[Blythe Terrell]

They can find a link to our transcript in our show notes.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

Thank you, Blythe. Like I mentioned, we just started a YouTube channel, so you can come and find us@Science Vspodcast. That's where we are. There's gonna be a link in the show notes and. And while you are looking at the transcript, you can click on it and find us there. See some of our video episodes And Blythe, like I said at the start of the show, we are taking a short break.

[Blythe Terrell]

Yeah, just a few weeks.

[Wendy Zuckerman]

We'll be back in a few weeks. All right. Bye bye. This episode was produced by produced by Blythe Terrell with help from McKetty Foster Keys, Meryl Horne, Rose Rimler, Michelle Dang and meet Wendy Zuckerman. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. I'm the executive producer. Fact checking by Diane Kelly. Research help from Erica Akiko Howard mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Music written by Bumi Hidaka, Peter Leonard, Emma Munger and Bobby Lord. Thanks to the researchers we spoke to for this episode, including Professor Marcus Egger. Thank you so much for your time. Thanks to Elsevier for sharing your raw milk book with us. Thanks to the Zuckerman family, Joseph Lavelle Wilson and Jack Weinstein. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.

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