Colorado’s raw milk bill was scuttled due to disagreements regarding the technicalities of the law, read more at the end of this post. Avian Flu was trending at the time, it seems to have waned, but unfortunately it came as a convenient excuse to push off discussions til next year.
Avian Influenza makes the rounds
So, the semi-perennial terror of Avian Influenza, aka Bird Flu or H5N1, has made the rounds again. All the surveillance sites in my state have been opened up and closed, with the exception of WSU Pullman, it apparently ripped through Washington back in December 2023 and died down. You’ll have to check your local monitors for info about your area. Here’s an unofficial map put together by Claudinne Miller at UNMC GCHS.
CDC reports 1 person has contracted the Bird Flu while working with cows on a conventional dairy farm, the second person since 2022, neither related to milk consumption. Particles of H5N1 may have been found in pasteurized milk. As we know, pasteurization allows farmers to lean on brute sanitation and throw cleanliness to the wayside for the sake of financial and operational efficiency. Pasteurization kills the bugs, but it doesn’t remove the poop.
Avian Flu has not been found in raw milk, nor has it been found making anyone sick through raw milk. FDA put out an advisory warning not to consume raw milk from animals showing symptoms of Avian Flu.
Some voices, who are always biased against raw milk, crop up to say “ooh, well, what about this, aren’t ya scared now?” with a belligerent rat’s nest of spooky hypotheticals. CDC says the risk to humans is low, I’m not too impressed with the social media busking.
Dealing with sick cows is a regular part of dairy production. Avian Flu is just another thing for farmers to watch out for in their herds.
A bottle of milk either doesn’t have a bug, which wouldn’t be of anyone’s concern; or a bottle of milk does have a bug, which it might unsafe for people with weakened immune systems. There’s no need for superstition. Farmers should watch over their cows and consider testing cows for Avian Flu on the farm.
Or you can freak out.
The boy who cried Bird Flu
Avian Flu affects many backyard chickens and other animals. Regulatory agencies respond by killing millions of birds, most of which are not sick or infected, even if they might be miles away from the nearest confirmed case. This ordered culling of millions of healthy birds fuels conspiracy theories, while also causing reasonable farmers and onlookers to become increasingly skeptical toward the approach.
CDC reports 1 person has contracted the virus in 2024. Photos on the Internet show a hispanic male in Texas, in his 20s or 30s, with red bloodshot eyes, similar to pink eye, after presumably working with infected cows on a conventional (feed lot) dairy farm without using respiratory or eye protection. Back in 2022, the first of the two human cases, the infected person was an incarcerated worker who was involved in the culling of poultry at a commercial farm in Colorado’s Montrose County. Both cases were directly working with animals, both received anti-virals and recovered quickly.
Forbes contributor from the Mayo Clinic has since posed the question “Could Avian Influenza Be The Next Covid-19?” Notice, this Director of Clinical Virology is “just asking questions,” similar to his inverse reflection in the conspiracy theory crowd which I’m sure he thinks he shares no resemblance to. Sure, anything could happen.
Mother Jones staff has wielded this situation and its hypotheticals to lash out against their enemies in the tradcore housewife and fitness influencer scenes – tldr screensoaked millennials shouting at other millennials within mobile app ecosystems, etc.
Also, check out these screencaps from an article from ACSH. The headline reads “Avian Flu Virus Is Spreading And Has Been Found In Raw Milk…”
Text of the article reads “Sensitive tests have not detected infectious virus in milk, but federal officials are advising not to drink raw milk or eat raw milk-based cheese.”
This unserious behavior produces skepticism towards science writers, justifiably. It also produces skepticism towards regulation, which is then used as an argument for total deregulation. Complete obliteration of our government’s regulatory bodies would ironically benefit biggest, dirtiest farms, which are likely to slide fully back into Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle if given the opportunity. Overregulation of backyard farms causes popular outrage that is then employed by massive agricultural interests to erode support for their well-earned safeguards.
Speaking of big farms, Avian Flu was circulating in industrial farms for up to four months before it was discovered.
One of the greater tragedies at play here is that our institutions will need more funding if they’re going to start doing actual science (hard science, technology, etc) to formulate strategies which are more surgical and precise, however we need to be able to trust that they aren’t simply going to attack us using our own tax dollars.
To the credit of FDA and CDC, their actual recommendations have been mostly sensible – ie isolate and remove from production any animal showing symptoms. They’re not the ones causing the panic, most of this unproductive discourse is driven by those “scientific” bloggers.
Updates on the hottest goss
May 15: High ranking health guru at the NECSI has republished known bunk news West Virginia politicians get sick from raw milk article, entangled with the topic of bird flu. Seems like his thread is geared toward dirtying RFK Jr’s candidacy, which could only succeed if they give him billions in free advertising as CNN did for Trump in 2016 (guess this milieu hasn’t learned). RFK Jr is the assumed spoiler candidate for POTUS who simply powered through some brain worms, which is something our country needs right now, however I’m not so sure the skillset transfers directly to outcomes at scale. In any case, I hope this highly-official misinformation superspreader finds the same strength.
A journalist from NPR went to four farms in Texas in what appears to be an effort to find bird flu in raw milk prompted by the previously mentioned medical busking. The testing facility told her they needed consent from the farmers to test the raw milk. One farmer in Texas, who is also active on Twitter, expressed that he would reject this engagement on the grounds that his raw milk production already complies with testing protocols and that he is skeptical of her intentions. The journalist doesn’t seem particularly rabid, it’s not a bad idea outside the consideration that there is no reliable test for bird flu in milk. FDA:
qPCR findings do not represent actual virus that may be a risk to consumers
However, her audience is clearly in witch hunt mode. There is also an element in this crowd who thinks she should lie to get the milk tested, mocking and shaming her to do so, in the desperate struggle for bias confirmation by any means. No conclusion was achieved here, so the angle of this crowd has been to imply that these farmers are untrustworthy because they refuse to cooperate with an angry mob of Twitter users.
Screencap above echos many comments and posts which accompanied the uproar stirred by a health official sharing misinformation.
May 18: Social media uproar has almost completely subsided. Search results for the query “raw milk” have returned to normal levels of, and balance between, positive discussion around raw milk and naysaying.
Avian Flu in raw milk
On April 24, 2024, FDA advised producers not to manufacture or sell raw milk from animals showing symptoms of Avian Flu.
Because of the limited information available about the possible transmission of HPAI A (H5N1) viruses in raw milk, the FDA recommends that industry does not manufacture or sell raw milk or raw milk cheese products made with milk from cows showing symptoms of illness, including those infected with avian influenza viruses or exposed to those infected with avian influenza viruses. By exposure, we generally mean cattle located on a premises with cattle with suspected or confirmed HPAI A (H5N1). Given the variety of premises sizes and the potential for state requirements, the FDA recommends producers consult with state regulatory officials and their veterinarian for further guidance.
Accordingly, the FDA recommends that milk from exposed, asymptomatic cattle only be used for pasteurized milk and milk products whether for human or animal feed channels. The FDA recommends that premises test for HPAI viruses in pooled milk prior to resuming commerce in unpasteurized dairy products following apparent resolution of illnesses on the premises.
In FDA’s updates page:
The FDA continues to advise strongly against the consumption of raw milk and recommends that industry does not manufacture or sell raw milk or raw milk products.
FDA is not saying you shouldn’t consume raw milk because Avian Flu. FDA is saying they always recommend not consuming raw milk. There’s no change in recommendation here. We already can’t agree on the original recommendation, ie whether or not 0.007% of raw milk consumers getting something like a stomach ache warrants the exclusion of raw milk, so this is just a hypothetical factor that may enter the existing matrix of risk presented with raw milk consumption at some point in the future.
If they do find Avian Flu in raw milk, I trust they’ll let us know. Hopefully, they’ll bring some real science (hard science, ie tools and technology) to the table if or when this occurs.
Colorado’s raw milk bill postponed
The Colorado Sun points out a disagreement between bill authors regarding what temperature raw milk must be kept and penalties for non-compliance.
They also would have had to keep containers of milk below 40 degrees during transport. Violations of the rules could result in a fine of $500 per container of milk, the bill proposed.
For reference, California requires raw milk for human consumption to be kept under 45ºF. This bill would’ve been more strict and the fines would be explosive if a refrigerator went out and a stash of milk got even a few degrees above 40ºF.
Raw milk legalization is still popular in the state. Governor Jared Polis hopes Colorado will “fully legalize the production and sale of raw milk, properly labeled, so that those who prefer it are able to legally obtain it with greater ease.” Avian Flu is simply a convenient excuse to scuttle the bill among other issues and bring it back later once the details have been agreed upon.
Bonus fact: Water freezes at 32ºF while milk freezes around 31ºF due to the thiccness.
Read more about Avian Influenza
Raw Milk Institute – Bird Flu and Raw Milk: Where is the Evidence?
