AD1184
Celestial
There are some interesting things written in that Guardian article above:
And yet, in the same article, we also learn from Michael Watson, an administrator with the US Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, that
So the statement "we believe our commercial milk is safe" means simply that a human is not going to get infected by drinking the end product (pasteurized milk and other dairy products). It does not mean that the method of production of that milk is safe, but it does seem to imply that there will be no actions taken to mitigate the dangers inherent in the production of that milk in causing an H5N1 outbreak in humans, due to the fear of push-back from dairy farmers.
Can they not suspend milking in infected farms? Can they not mandate better rodent control if that is a potential vector (not by using other mammals, like cats, to control the population, qv the other article above about cats on dairy farms)? Can they not mandate more stringent sanitation of milking equipment?
Donald Prater, acting director of the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, said: “We take the current situation very seriously. Based on information currently available, we believe our commercial milk is safe.”
And yet, in the same article, we also learn from Michael Watson, an administrator with the US Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, that
“We believe that the primary transfer is through milk … some kind of mechanical transmission,” said Watson. This could be via milking equipment, people moving between facilities or rodents, he added. “At this stage we’re just speculating,” he said. “[It could be] spilt milk on floors, if a rat was to come into contact with that milk and then move to a different facility or come into contact with a cow or a piece of equipment.”
So the statement "we believe our commercial milk is safe" means simply that a human is not going to get infected by drinking the end product (pasteurized milk and other dairy products). It does not mean that the method of production of that milk is safe, but it does seem to imply that there will be no actions taken to mitigate the dangers inherent in the production of that milk in causing an H5N1 outbreak in humans, due to the fear of push-back from dairy farmers.
Can they not suspend milking in infected farms? Can they not mandate better rodent control if that is a potential vector (not by using other mammals, like cats, to control the population, qv the other article above about cats on dairy farms)? Can they not mandate more stringent sanitation of milking equipment?