Got (Drugstore Cow) Milk?
Got milk?
While there is debate out there (i.e. T. Colin Campbell’s The China Study – good read if you haven’t yet) about cow’s milk and its benefits and dangers, a lot of us drink milk or at least give it to our children. But do you know where your milk comes from? If you said, cows, you are right. But do you know where those cows come from and how they are raised?
Many of you are familiar with CAFOs and “drugstore cows” and many of you are not. CAFOs are Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, where animals are pretty much confined in small places where they eat, urinate, defecate, and often die all in the same place with little or no grass or vegetation. There are many resources out there (look them up!) and these factory farms are perfect breeding grounds for bacterial growth and who knows what else. According to the CDC, over 75 million Americans get sick from the food they eat.
Note: these pigs are NOT from a CAFO – they are being humanely raised by a local farmer.
Drugstore cows are cows raised with unnatural diets and pumped with hormones and antibiotics to speed up their growth, which also speed up the possibility of illness (I actually had an argument recently with a woman who swore that a cow’s natural diet is corn and that the “media” was trying to lie to us that cows ate grass…did she think cows shucked corn with their hooves?). Most Americans are directly and indirectly affected by these hormones and drugs that have longer-term consequences than just a bad stomachache.
According to The Ecologist, the chemical pollutants passed from mother to child through the placenta or breastmilk can last decades…or even a lifetime. The EWG (Environmental Working Group) noted that it takes this long for a child to get rid of 99% of inherited pollution (note: that is not 100%):
- Phthalata platicisers (flexible plastics, etc.): 1 day
- Mercury: 1 year
- Flame retardant and stain-proofing chemicals: 12 – 60 years
- Lead: 166 years
This means generations of your children good be affected, causing permanent genetic changes. Does this mean simply not eating meat or drinking milk? But vegetables are not immune to bacteria and toxins. Recall outbreaks of E.coli in bagged spinach or the recent studies linking pesticides and ADHD. Check out this blog, Are You Sure You Want to Eat That?, for more information. Or what about the scandal of corporate greed and bribes and the sale of tainted foods?
So who is responsible for ensuring the safety of what we eat, meat or vegetable? In 2007, the FDA turned to states to step up their food safety programs. There is an ongoing debate whether federal or state control is more effective at ensuring the food safety of large national and multinational food companies.
Rather than getting caught up in this debate and risk harming ourselves and our families, it’s time that we recognize we are responsible for our food safety…as much as possible.
Buy local. Know where you food comes from. Better yet, know the person who grows or raises your food. If your food is not factory-produced or overly processed, the chances of these contaminants become lower. We cannot rely on some federal or state government regulation to do this for us. We have to take charge of our own lives.
Let’s start with our milk since many of our children drink it daily. where is my milk from? is a great website where you can source most of your dairy products.
Source: where is my milk from?
PS June is Dairy Month! For more and an insightful video, check this out.
A drug-free glass of milk and one of ZomppaPatty’s Whoopie Pies. Now that’s something I can get behind.
Category: Featured Articles: Food Politics, Featured Articles: Health & Nutrition, Food Politics, Health & Nutrition
Here in Ireland all our cows eat grass in the summer and silage (cut grass mixed with field crops) during the grazing season. Also, our milk goes off after 7 days max! I used to be so shocked by the extended sell by dates on milk and other products in the US.
B – I’d like to see more articles like this from you. This was extremely informative, and I appreciate that you’ve provided us with tangible figures of how some of these chemicals impact us.
And yes the argument that cows feed on corn naturally … aiyahh-yah!
Good article. My conscious is clear on this front at least – we’re lucky here in rural England that we have our choice of local, organic dairy farms. Our milk is delivered by our milkman every other day, in glass bottles that get re-used. The farm it comes from is so close that we drive past it on the way to take the children to school and shout out a hello and thanks to the cows in the field. We also get our eggs from an organic free-range farm further along the same route. They operate a ‘rent-a-hen’ service whereby you sponsor a hen and get a set number of eggs per week. The kids love visiting ‘their’ hen and I love that our food is fresh, healthy and karma-neutral! I hope these sorts of schemes will catch on and become mainstream, enabling more people to participate.
Excellent post. You raise many of the issues that forced me to stop drinking cow’s milk last year. I’ve been desperately seeking a local source of raw milk but have been unsuccessful. It is astounding to me that it is illegal in many states for farmers to sell raw milk. It goes to show just how much influence the large dairy operations have over our lawmakers.
I read china study for a health class in college recently and was blown away, it is truly an amzing book, great post loaded with great info
sweetlife
Totally true and valid your milk concerns!
Fortunately, my country only produces natural milk and the cows are feed with natural pastures – Uruguay is one of the biggest exporters of milks worldwide.
Cheers,
Gera
What a great article. Although I use to drink milk as a kid from a local dairy. We use to go fill up a container from the bottom drain plug, right after it came out of the cow, still warm. Feces and dirt would have to settle before you could drink it. i NEVER got sick, but I was a dirty little kid, LOL. Thankfully I grew to be lactose intolerant.
I’ve just become more aware of this issue -thanks for sharing!
Wonderful post!Informative and interesting.
Very good article. I rarely buy milk, and when I do it’s organic. When I’m eating out, I ask for soy milk if organic milk is not an option. When I visited Europe a few years, I learned a lot about diary food. It’s senseless what the U.S. food companies are doing to our health. Purchasing local ingredients, especially diary, is very important to our diets.
great info! I do hope that the milk we get at Wegmans is pretty healthy, I’ll be sure to find out.
Great article! We should all investigate where our food comes from!
Thanks everyone. Boy, so many of you are lucky with knowing your dairy farmers. Ruby, the rent-a-hen model is brilliant! Thank you for sharing.
Wow, what a fun article! Thanks, Belinda!
This is such a great piece! Our soon to be one year old just transitioned to whole milk. Scary stuff.
this is a great informative post belinda. Thanks for sharing. And I like the bit about the woman who believe cow’s main diet is corn:) funny stuff.