ICFA Members Testify at California Raw Milk Hearings

Dr. Ted Beals - Pathologist

I really applaud you for spending the time that you are on this topic. It is extraordinarily complex. And at this stage of testimony from people that is high technical, your eyes aren�t glazing over. And somehow or other, I have a very hard time. I have given you an extensive written statement with annotation in it so that you can look at it. I will not go over the details of that at this time with the hope that dialogue on some of these key questions that are focused to you all are ones that we can get into. And I�ll pick on a couple of those, because your questions that have been asked in this hearing cause me to rethink one of the topics that I had almost dismissed from my written testimony. So I�ll expand on that.

I come at this from kind of a unique perspective and so let me give you just a little background on myself. I�m a retired pathologist from Michigan. My professional life has been devoted to providing the best possible health care to those who served our country in time of need. Thirty-one years as a practicing diagnostic pathologist at the VA Medical Center in Anarbor. But during that same time, I was on the faculty of the University of Michigan in which my responsibility was to emerging young, bright, energetic medical students and it was my responsibility to give them the best information that I could to prepare them for their life as physicians. And then in my final years, I had the privilege of being appointed in the federal senior executive service responsible for the operations of the VA medical system�s nationwide diagnostic service. And so, I did have an opportunity to serve at that role and it brought a whole new perspective to what it is.

For the past five years my wife and I switched from drinking commercial Grade-A milk to consuming more than three gallons per week of what we in Michigan call, fresh unprocessed milk.

Let me divert for a moment because it will come up again a little later.

In the state of Michigan, unlike this state, the dairy laws ___ milk laws, have a very small phrase that just simply says, "If it�s not pasteurized you can�t sell it." And we are one of the states where we have developed a program of cow shares in which people, as you know and have heard about and I don�t need to reiterate how that works�.my wife and I were privileged to be invited by our Department of Agriculture to sit on a workgroup consisting of their senior staff in dairy science, the milk producing representatives, dairy farmers who were involved in cow shares, and consumers, to sit with them and discuss how best to enable this product to be made available to the consumers who wished it in the state of Michigan. We have spent more than 30 hours sitting around a table talking about that. And one of the very first things that we did was to recognize that in the state of Michigan raw milk is defined in the Michigan milk laws as milk which is destined to be pasteurized. And so we realized right at the very beginning that we had a problem and it�s not just a semantics problem, it�s a very real problem, and I think you all need to appreciate that and I want to make that point.

So the first thing that we did was to essentially accept, around our table, as a consensus, that the product that we are talking about is a different product. And we chose this term �fresh, unprocessed milk� to make us, all around that table, aware of the fact that the product that we are talking about is a fundamentally different product than the product that they deal with on a daily basis, and the PMO deals with, and our state milk laws deal with. And in your case it�s a little different because you are one of those few states that actually don�t have that sentence in your milk laws and so it isn�t�.so I come at it from that perspective and it�s important.

I was trained as a diagnostic pathologist to make the very best accurate decisions that I could in the care of people. As a teacher, I was faced, every time I stood in front of the medical students, with the point that I wanted to make sure that what I was telling them was not just simply the dogma that I had been told by my mentors but was in fact tested by current research, current knowledge in the advancements that we�ve come forth. And I would propose to you that one of the reasons that you have two panels here today that seem to be giving you very conflicting information is because of that problem of dogma.

Dogma is sincerely believed by the people who say it. To them it is fact. And as I kept telling myself every time I went in front of medical students, I said �These are very bright people. And I know for a fact that some of the things that I was told as dogma are now just simply not true. And it wasn�t because my mentors were wrong, it was because of the state at the time, that was what they truly believed and when they told it to me, that�s sincerely what they believed.� So there is a difference of opinion here. It has everything to do with sincerity, because you hear it and the people are very sincere. I think you, as legislators, need to look beyond dogma and do that second reality check. Is this really fact in the light of current knowledge and where we stand? And I think that�s a responsibility that you have, and I suspect that that�s a responsibility because you�re here, that you take seriously.

Let me cover a couple of areas that have not been covered by the people that have come before us.

SENATOR FLOREZ: And I think you�re saying dogma cuts both ways, right?
DR. BEAL: Yes. Absolutely. We�ve got to look at both ways and I�m trying to make that point.

Over untold generations of human development, the persistent consumption of milk has been integrated into the complex relationships we have with the microflora of our bodies. We must appreciate that because we reproduce and grow at a slow rate, it would require a very long time to modify our side of this relationship. But the microorganisms grow, divide and modify at a phenomenal rate. Many of the bacteria in our intestines multiply every 20 minutes and genetic alterations occur spontaneously and regularly. Although it takes a long time for people to change in a way that modifies these complex relationships, the microorganisms are modifying as we watch.

The more we look and the more we understand that this relationship between people and their personal microflora, both in their intestine and on their skin and in their mouths and in many other locations is extremely complex. And because of the persistent use of milk in the diet of many people of the world, we and our associated microorganisms have developed some incredibly important and interdependent mechanisms for survival. This has happened because the consumption of milk conferred significant competitive advantages. It is obvious, but it needs to be stated, that if milk had been hazardous to the individuals in communities that consumed it, the drinking of milk would have disappeared centuries ago.

What scientists are beginning to understand is that milk producers in their zeal for producing a product that would satisfy their customers, have had very serious unanticipated consequences. We should be quite honest that the major reason for pasteurization of commercial milk has to do with shelf life. It still has to do with shelf life and that�s why they keep pushing the limits of pasteurization. In that regard, they have always said it was about safety, but I think you should realize that it�s really about the persistence of shelf life which is, from a business point of view, extraordinarily important, because if they�ve got a product that spoils before the consumers can consume it, then clearly, they�re not going to be able to sell that product. And so, that is correct. The important thing to understand is that the thing that spoils milk is not pathogens. Spoiled milk is not hazardous to our health, it�s just extraordinarily unpleasant to the consumer and as a result, it makes an unmarketable product.

SENATOR FLOREZ: You mean an unprofitable product.
DR. BEALS: Yes. It sounds acceptable, so therefore�
SENATOR FLOREZ: Here in the Legislature, it�s our number one issue everyday, profits.
DR. BEALS: It is profits. One of the interesting things that we haven�t said up here, which I do want to emphasize, is that there have been large numbers of studies that have talked about risky behavior. And one of them is that in the recent years the FDA has been looking very seriously at pathogen content of what we all know as bulk tank milk and they�ve been taking that very seriously. Interestingly enough, that is all milk which is routinely sampled as part of the regular processing that goes on under regulatory and business practices. They�ve been doing that. Almost all of those studies bring up a very interesting point and that is, that from their perspective, the farm families, many of the farm families that they are surveying in fact are drinking, consuming regularly, the milk out of their bulk tanks. And they refer to this as the point that this is a very risky behavior. And as a result, we really ought to do a better job of educating our farmers that they ought not to be consuming this hazardous product.

The interesting thing about those scientific papers is that I haven�t read a single one of those papers that said that they were finding farm families that were getting sick. From a physician, this is a very important point. I don�t know exactly why that is, and there are probably a number of reasons, and we can go into them, but I think it�s a very important fact that we ought to look at.

One of the other things that I want to point out, is that the CDC which does a very good job of looking at incidents of food-borne illness, and you all are aware of them, I have not seen a single example of an incident of food-borne illness in which everybody that was exposed to the product got sick, even when the amount that they consumed was the same amount that the people who got sick got. As a physician, this is a very, very interesting fact and it is one that we have not spent a lot of time about. I would suspect, in fact, that there are some very complex reasons why not everybody gets sick when they consume a product that has pathogens.

Not so long ago, one argument for using the generic bacterial cultures for monitoring safety of which coliforms is one, was that testing for specific pathogens was not practical. This has changed dramatically.

In the state of Michigan where our cow share farmers are very concerned about safety of their product, and they are not, obviously, currently regulated by the state, as a matter of fact, the state inspectors will refuse to come to them because they don�t sell milk; it�s a kind of interesting problem. We have been unable to find a routine certified dairy laboratory that does not offer routine rapid turnaround pathogen testing at a limit they all were willing to pay for and was turned around in very rapid times that made it practical to do that. Because I think that�s a critical point that needs to be addressed. Because, I went to the labs; I went to the dairy labs and I asked them specifically. They all offer this test on fresh product. And they will call you if they get the answer within 24-hours, the next day. And to my way of thinking, this is by far a much more practical way of going, now that that technology has gotten to the point where it has.

SENATOR FLOREZ: So you don�t agree with the last panel that this is a process that is too expensive; would delay the process so people would go out of business, in essence?
DR. BEALS: Absolutely not.
SENATOR FLOREZ: And you don�t disagree that this would be an inexpensive process for the industry that charges a Milk Pool fee, for example? I mean, this is something that would be beyond�
DR. BEALS: Yeah, it�s a California issue. We don�t have that in the state of Michigan, so I can�t actually talk knowledge about that. But some of the farmers here, some of the producers here could talk about that.

But as far as the question on pathogen is concerned, there�s two points that I want to make. Number one, the labs offer the test. The labs offer to give you the results the next day. It takes 18 hours of incubation, pre-incubation time, and about 15 minutes to run through the machines. And they can get you the answer if you want the answer back.

To my way of thinking as a food safety expert, that�s not bad timing. That�s not as good as I�d like it, but it�s not bad timing. So let me go on and�

SENATOR FLOREZ: And you would say that takes us, as has been mentioned, from testing at the monitoring stage to where we should be testing, in other words, so at the end of the process?
DR. BEALS: Yes. At this point in my written testimony I gave three sentences to HACCP because quite honestly, because I wasn�t aware of this committee and what you have, I thought that was a lofty goal that you would not be interested in.
SENATOR FLOREZ: You could say you didn�t think we understand that stuff; that�s fine; too lofty of a goal for the Food-Borne Illness Committee to understand. But it is something that we are very interested in, yes.
DR. BEALS: One of the reasons that I was appointed to my executive position in the VA system was because I was very concerned about critical point analysis and risk. And from my experience in the laboratory and just simply my experience in blood banking, risk analysis is an extraordinarily important thing. Critical point analysis for blood banking is at the highest level of anything that I know of. And so, we looked at it very seriously.

Let me point out a couple of things and we can talk a dialogue, if you will, about HACCP, because I think that is a very logical way to go and to do it. Let me say something about HACCP, though. If you�re going to do HACCP, you have to look at the product and you can�t say that the HACCP�.there is a voluntary HACCP in the PMO. I don�t know whether you know that, but there is one there. It�s being used by some of the processors. That HACCP is really defined by what�s happening within the manufacturing process itself. If you�re going to do a HACCP concept as you�re thinking about it for a product like raw milk, you need to look at it from the quality of the soils to the product which gets into the consumers mouth.

SENATOR FLOREZ: Like these two pictures here?
DR. BEALS: The two pictures are part of that. But I really honestly believe that if the product that we�re talking about is predominantly a pastured product, then the quality of that pasture is very much a function of the soils. And so, the HACCP plan doesn�t start where the machinery is, it starts back where you are. So you are willing to consider a HACCP concept for raw dairy in this state which looks at that, then I significantly applaud you and I believe most of the people that are in food safety from an intellectual academic point of view would agree with you and I�d like to pursue that as well.

SENATOR FLOREZ: And would you say that would be, as one of the last panels did, a better, safer food process thought in terms of making this a safer product if HACCP was the guiding principle versus the test, the one test�the coliform test?
DR. BEALS: I�ll flat out say that if I had a HACCP versus a coliform count on a finished product, I�ll take the HACCP plan anytime.
SENATOR FLOREZ: Great. Then we have agreement between both panels, then.
DR. BEALS: With the understanding, and by the way, the same understanding because they said the same thing. It has to be a HACCP plan which looks at the whole product; it has good monitors; it has a mechanism for auditing; and that�s where the regulators are, is in that auditing process, to make sure that it goes. Let me give my conclusions because then I can do it and you can ask some questions.

My conclusions to this panel are: Raw market milk is a different dairy product with properties that require that it be processed differently. Regulatory controls for raw market milk need to be scientifically and statistically determined and must take these special properties into consideration, and a good HACCP plan would do that.

The use of coliform counts to indicate the safety of milk has outlived whatever usefulness it had decades ago. I don�t think there�s any question about that. Testing for specific food-borne pathogens in milk can contribute to our goal of providing safe milk for the public. Raw market milk has beneficial properties that include an important microflora that must be carefully preserved to maximize quality. And raw market milk may not be for everyone, but for those that value this dairy product, they should be allowed to chose the benefits as we all work together to minimize the risks.

Thank you very much for your time and patience.

Read:

Liz Reitzig Testimony - VICFA

Sally Fallon Testimony - President Weston A. Price Foundation

Dr. Robert Irons Testimony - Nutritional Immunologist - MOICFA

Dr. Ted Beals Testimony - Pathologist