Tag Archives: mark crislip

March 12, 2012 · 2:00 AM

Is Raw Milk Safe?

Caveat emptor

Interest in consuming nonpasteurized milk and cheese seems to be increasing in the U.S. over the last couple years. I don’t know why. Is it safe?

In case you’ve forgotten, the process of pasteurization is designed to kill pathogenic organisms that raw milk may harbor. Campylobacter and Salmonella are two of the common pathogens.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this month published an article on disease outbreaks associated with nonpasteurized dairy products. Bottom line: Nonpasteurized products are 150 times more likely to be associated with foodborne illness compared to pasteurized product. The CDC wants states to consider more stringent regulation.

It’s hard to be sure, but my sense is that foodborne illness related to nonpasteurized dairy products in the U.S. is pretty uncommon, if not rare.

Mark Crislip at Science-Based Medicine says pasteurization is a good thing.

As for me, I’m not going out of my way looking for nonpasteurized milk and cheese.

Steve Parker, M.D.

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April 10, 2011 · 2:00 AM

Quote of the Day

Science-based surgery (usually)

Regarding complementary and alternative medicine:

The sciences give a mostly coherent understanding of the world.  Mostly coherent. [They do] give an understanding of the possible, the probable, the improbable and the impossible.  Most of the sciences, unlike parts of medical science,  are not concerned with the impossible.  There is not complementary and alternative physics, or chemistry, or biochemistry, or engineering.  These disciplines compare their ideas against reality, and, if the ideas are found wanting, abandoned.   Perpetual motion is not considered seriously by any academic physicist; if perpetual motion were an alternative medicine it would be offered at a Center by a Harvard Professor of Medicine.

                    —Dr. Mark Crislip, infectious disease specialist,  at Science-Based Medicine, April 8, 2011

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