When H5N1 avian flu was detected in commercial raw milk samples from a dairy called Raw Farm in California in December, the company released a press statement: “There are no illnesses associated with H5N1 in our products, but rather this is a political issue.”
To critics of raw milk — and of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., potential Health and Human Services secretary and evangelist of the beverage — the discovery of H5N1 was a sign that it should be banned. But perhaps the discovery means that the checks in our public health systems are working.
For the past several months, I’ve been reporting on raw milk and the cultural debate surrounding it. My work has taught me that to dismiss raw milk as belonging only to the political right is to deny its inevitable rise and miss out on opportunities for regulation. Raw milk is consumed across the country, by people of different income brackets and party affiliations, and around the world. And I’ve come to believe that a safe product is possible. It depends, however, on a web of trust between health officials, consumers, and producers — something that I fear is increasingly hard to come by as raw milk is increasingly politicized and identified with RFK Jr.
To be clear, RFK Jr.’s influence as health secretary over milk policy would be limited. It’s been a state issue for 100 years. In 1924, the FDA and the U.S. Public Health Service established the predecessor to what is today the Pasteurized Milk Ordinance, which provides federal guidelines on milk sanitation. States can choose whether to adopt the PMO either in piecemeal or in its entirety, hence the differing laws across local borders. It’s hard to say how many states have legalized raw milk because of the contingencies in state laws — some allow raw milk sale only for pet consumption, like in Florida (which is frequently flouted), or don’t allow it in grocery stores, like in Massachusetts. Only one state, New Jersey, disallows raw milk in any form.
Raw milk is more available today than in recent decades, which means that the risk is more widespread. Like eating sashimi or spinach, when we choose a raw product, we know that it could host harmful bacteria such as salmonella, campylobacter, and E. coli, but that doesn’t mean we avoid sashimi or spinach altogether — we just take precautions. We wash our bagged salads and don’t eat sushi from the gas station (right, everyone?). Similarly, raw milk as a product isn’t inherently dangerous with the appropriate management.
South Carolina offers one model for what that might look like. According to the National Outbreak Recording System by the CDC, there has been no evidence of an outbreak due to raw milk in South Carolina since 2011. South Carolina allows off-farm sales of raw milk for human consumption. Health officials in South Carolina demand high standards of on-site sanitation on farms, testing for presence of bacteria (with a limit of 10,000 bacteria per milliliter of milk), and strict packaging regulations.
California, where avian flu was detected in raw milk recently, has quite similar laws, though it has a 50% higher threshold for the presence of bacteria. But perhaps the most important difference is trust. Notably, South Carolina law says that the Department of Health and Environmental Control will inspect a farm and its milk as frequently as their risk level requires. As in, if you’ve been producing shoddy milk recently, you’ll get inspected more than a neighbor who has always kept good health practices. Should a pathogen be found, the producing farm’s raw milk permit could be suspended until they can show evidence of two germ-free milkings.
California’s laws, on the other hand, do not call for the revocation of a farmer’s permit if the milk is found to be unsafe, only that the milk be taken off the market and disposed of safely until the cause has been “corrected or eliminated,” in no specific terms — as is the case with Raw Farm, the producer of the contaminated batch. (Raw Farm has put infected milk out to market before. According to the New York Times, this includes a salmonella outbreak that sickened 171 people and hospitalized 22 from September 2023 to March 2024, and further E. coli, campylobacter, and listeria outbreaks.)
In South Carolina, those who choose to drink raw milk can feel assured that any product on the market is safe, well-monitored, and with a spotless track record; in speaking to producers in South Carolina, too, I’ve gathered that they welcome collaboration with the health department, since that seal of approval keeps their business running.
Then, a safe raw milk market can be envisioned like a three-legged milking stool, a classic metaphor for the dairy industry, where health officials, consumers, and producers carry equal weight of responsibility in preventing disease outbreaks. This is even more important at a time where people want to buy raw milk, and if they can’t do so legally, they’ll do it riskily.
Before it was made legal in Georgia, people would smuggle in raw milk from South Carolina. Moving raw milk across state lines without the intent to pasteurize it is illegal. And, for those living in states where human consumption of the product is banned, there’s a potential loophole if you don’t mind drinking pet food. I snicker at a blog post from Florida farm titled “Why Are Our Products Labelled ‘Pet Consumption Only’?!?” that laments “We can not engage in ANY conversation regarding humans consuming any of our products.” It’s a bit like a sign at a headshop warning that you’ll be kicked out if you mention the word “marijuana.”
The problem with these “moo-nshine strategies” is that each party is given plausible deniability under the law when producers and consumers are deliberately shirking from regulation. If you consume infected pet milk — milk that everyone involved knows or should know will be ingested by humans — producers and regulators can say, “Well, it wasn’t meant for people.” If you bring it across state lines then get sick on the other side, you risk incriminating yourself under the law and under the decree of “I told you so.” The metaphorical milking stool collapses, the milk is a mess.
One important point to remember is that the unprecedented demand for raw milk is a lifeline for an industry that’s experiencing economic challenges, with family farms across the country closing left and right. The legalization of raw milk could allow dairies to sell directly to consumers, since they wouldn’t have to sell their milk to milk handlers for processing. Then, they wouldn’t be beholden to pricing set by Federal Milk Marketing Orders and could set their own pricing.
Though legalization of raw milk can soothe aching dairy markets, it cannot be thoughtlessly or blanketly applied. Thorough testing and permitting is imperative on dairy farms. We would need to ensure that distributors are equipped with the correct refrigeration technology to prevent spoilage, and that consumers are adequately educated on the health risks of the product and its safe management. Each leg of the stool has to be strengthened and reinforced by legislation and infrastructure.
The safety of raw milk needs to be taken seriously at this time, when avian flu is on the rise. Just recently, an elderly man succumbed to the disease — the first mortality in the U.S. To be clear, he did not contract it by drinking raw milk; it seems he caught it from a backyard flock. But H5N1 is epidemic in cows and sheds freely in milk. The National Milk Testing Strategy has been implemented by the USDA to help states surveil for and respond to H5N1 if detected. Of the 28 states enrolled, California is one of three “affected” with H5N1. Interestingly, South Carolina hasn’t enrolled in the plan at all. (This doesn’t mean that they don’t have their own contingency plans). The USDA also passed a Federal Order on Dec. 6, 2024, stating that all dairy farms, bulk milk transporters, or any entity that deals with unpasteurized milk must allow their product to be tested for bird flu. This investment into monitoring might be what some producers, consumers, and regulators need to feel secure about their raw milk products.
In some corners of the political discourse, raw milk has come to symbolize all that’s wrong with the incoming Trump administration and our anxieties about the future of public health. Even more so in a pandemic-wary climate, and in light of the news that the head of Raw Farms, the California institution with the history of outbreaks, says that RFK Jr. asked him to apply for an advisory role at the FDA.
Just like anything in politics, the raw milk debate should be less about ideology and more about execution. Safe raw milk markets depend upon trust in legislation, which is, admittedly, harder than ever nowadays.
Bianca Garcia is an audio documentarian and M.S. candidate in media, medicine, and health at Harvard Medical School.