The bandits you trust

It’s a little late for April Fool’s. And I don’t think that Associated Press reporters are known for their senses of humor. But nonetheless, this is the headline that I read on the AP website yesterday:

“Police: Someone is Sneaking onto New York Dairy Farms and Contaminating Milk With Antibiotics.”

To borrow a phrase from Dave Barry, I am not making this up. Dairy farmers are actually up in arms that someone has been contaminating their cows and their milk with antibiotics.

I guess they figure that’s their job.
Nobody’s sneaking – the contamination is blatant

Really, if it’s suddenly illegal to contaminate milk, the police are going to have to issue an arrest warrant for nearly every dairy farmer in America. Because every day, most farmers intentionally contaminate their milk – not only with antibiotics, but growth hormones as well.

Most farmers regularly add antibiotics to their animals’ feed as a preventative measure, to protect against infections that spread quickly through herds due to the animals’ crowded living conditions. (This isn’t just true of dairy farmers, it’s also widespread practice in raising cattle, chickens, pigs, you name it.) On top of that, dairy cows that are being continuously milked often develop an udder infection called mastitis – and, as a result, are treated with antibiotic injections. (Guess what the leading cause of mastitis in dairy cows is? More on that later.)

The mainstream will tell you that these antibiotics don’t make it into the milk supply, and pose no threat to humans. They’ll point to the tests that are done on milk before packaging, which are supposed to screen for “contaminants.” But many independent tests have shown that the milk on grocery store shelves DOES contain antibiotic residues – either as a result of shoddy screening or the use of illegal antibiotics that can’t be detected under current procedures. In fact, in one study conducted by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), about 38 percent of milk on grocery store shelves contained antibiotic residues from illegal antibiotics.

You can’t discuss antibiotic use in the dairy industry without talking about hormone use as well. Bovine growth hormone use is perhaps an even greater threat – and it is a key cog in this vicious cycle. Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) is a genetically engineered hormone that is regularly injected into dairy cows to artificially increase their milk production. So how does that relate to antibiotics? Well, cows given rBGH are also MUCH more likely to develop mastitis (even the manufacturer of rBGH warns that it may increase mastitis incidence as much as 80 percent). And you know what mastitis leads to – more antibiotic use, and more antibiotic residues in our milk. (There are other documented risks associated with rBGH, but that’s a topic for another time.)
Everyone’s red-handed

All of this has been going on for years. And, around the world, groups of concerned consumers have been raising the issue and asking for better controls. For the most part, those concerns have gone unheard.

But now, the police are on the job – because farmers are losing money. (To clarify, it seems they can only sell milk that THEY fill with antibiotics.) Since the incidents began in the fall, about 44,000 gallons of milk have had to be trashed, representing a loss of about $49,000 for the dairy farmers in western New York.

The article says they have “no suspects,” although they are looking “any number of places, from animal rights groups opposed to dairy farm practices to disgruntled farmers or employees.”

Yes, the dairy farmers just can’t seem to imagine who would do something like this – other than themselves, that is.

To Your Good Health,

Jenny Thompson
Health Sciences Institute

Copyright 1997-2002 by Institute of Health Sciences, L.L.C.