A short thread on the supposed "dangers" of drinking raw (unpasturized) milk.

(Re-up)

Around 3.4% of Americans drink raw milk regularly. That's just around 11,000,000 people. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/joca.12001

The CDC found (in a study hostile to raw milk) that from 2007 to 2012 there were 979 illnesses. Zero deaths reported.

Over a six year period, that's an average of 163 illnesses per year from drinking raw milk.

Young children seemed to be over-represented:

"...38% of illnesses caused by Salmonella and 28% of illnesses caused by Shiga toxin–producing E. coli were in children 1–4 years of age."

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/21/1/14-0447_article

163 / 11,000,000 = 0.000015

So you have, according to the CDC's own numbers, a 0.0015% chance of getting sick from raw milk any given year and a (virtually) 0.0% chance of dying.

Some other stats:

In 2018, there were around 32,000 deaths from car accidents in the United States. With the population in 2018, that's a 0.01% chance of dying on the road.

https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/812826

According to NOAA, you have a 0.006% chance of getting struck by lightning at least once in your life.

https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-odds

So, you are almost 10x more likely to die in a car accident and almost 6x more likely to get struck by lightning once in your life than you are from just getting *sick* from drinking raw milk.

There is essentially no risk to drinking raw milk, especially if you're not a young child, elderly, or immuno-compromised in some way.