Carth: t3knomanser: Carth: Around 200 people got sick from raw milk/cheese in 2002

Raw numbers are meaningless without context. Raw milk is not sold in the same volumes as processed milk.

It is legal in 28 states and just about all of Europe. 9.7 million people in the US regularly drink raw milk (if that helps put the 200 in context for you) .

Considering the level of illness in France, where raw milk and cheese are so common and you can actually but it from vending machines, is incredibly low I don't see why the US would be very different.

Europe's food supply chain is inherently safer than the US. The US supply chain, as regulated by the USDA and FDA, is based upon the principle that all food will be properly processed and stabilized before being consumed. You can dump raw eggs all over raw hamburger in Europe and nobody would bat an eye. In the US, that is like playing Russian roulette with your guts. The regulatory standards here are built around factory farms and large processing plants, not small craft farms. You can't have two sets of standards in one marketplace so we have to go with the one that is geared toward the dangerous players who provide the bulk of the food, not the craft farmers who may be able to provide safer food. In other words, if you want to eat like that you either have to form your own self-contained food supply or go somewhere that isn't dominated by the same industrial approach to food that we have in the US. Any exceptions to the food safety rules would be exploited by major players and result in massive outbreaks of food borne illnesses. You know that, I know that, and anyone with a brain knows that. You can't write exceptions to the laws without allowing the major players to exploit those rules, because they buy the legislation in the first place. It will be introduced by industry shills in Congress and pass because the major players are already setting up the infrastructure to take advantage of it to capture more market share. And on the local level they will force property sales to their subsidiaries by introducing zoning restrictions requiring massive capital investments, with no grandfathering clause (but they will give you 3 years to make the required changes before you are shut down). It is trivially easy to do the local market takeovers, actually, especially on something like this because it won't be high profile. It will be like that insurance company that is forcing the battered women's shelter in Cincinnati to sell to them, despite the location being the best suited for women to reach. Or they could do it through eminent domain, buying the cooperation of the local authorities to hand them the land as I saw in Indianapolis several times.

George Carlin was right about us having owners and the only way to have any chance at some veneer of safety is to not give them loopholes or exemptions to exploit. Otherwise we become China.

awalkingecho: Alternatively we can get around to accepting the fact that we're the only species who utilizes the milk of a mammal that isn't our own and that it's not natural, and just stop drinking EITHER.

That works too.

Hint: Humans are a part of nature, and hence by definition anything we do is natural.
And your basic point is erroneous as well. There are wild animals who have been caught drinking milk from the teats of domesticated animals like goats and dairy cows. The only reason why no other animals do this is because they don't have the intelligence to systematically keep other animals lactating past the weaning of their young. We adapt the world to suit our needs, from domesticating other animals and plants to reshaping the landscape. And we do so because we are naturally evolved to do so.nHumans can't digest milk on their own, yet many of us have gut bacteria specifically evolved to help us digest it. That by itself shows that it is indeed natural. We have co-evolved with other species to be able to drink it. Why do you hate our natural intestinal flora and fauna? Why do you hate what we naturally have become and try to make us into something that we are not?