There was a lot of legal and public health talent on display at the hearing on the legal challenge by Ontario raw milk drinkers to get the long-standing ban on raw dairy declared unconstitutional.
Superior Court, who presided over the
raw milk trial.
Some half dozen lawyers argued for the entire past week on all aspects of the constitutional precedents and legalities. And the lawyers referred to lengthy depositions from about a dozen esteemed public health and farming experts of various persuasions, which all the lawyers except the one representing the raw milk drinkers used, as fodder to argue that raw milk remains so unsafe that Ontario can’t make the slightest change to its nearly total ban on raw milk sales and distribution.
The government and industry lawyers argued that so long as raw milk potentially makes even a few people sick, allowing its sale and distribution, even on a limited basis, constitutes an unacceptable risk. They smeared researchers who published convincing evidence a couple years back showing that raw milk has become safer over the last decade, suggesting darkly that the data had somehow been manipulated, or that the researchers were “lobbyists” (as if none of the public health experts have ever done well paid consulting for corporations, nonprofits, or government agencies). And, of course, their favorite argument: raw milk is most dangerous to children.
But missing from the nearly five days of court arguments was anything about how the dairy business is shifting, and how, without significant changes to how dairy is marketed and distributed, the dairy farms that underlie it face ever greater danger of failure. It would have been useful if the lawyers had featured an expert or two on the collapse of the American dairy monopoly personified by Dean Foods–provided testimony about how a company with a major industry monopoly managed to go bankrupt, as Dean did last year. The culprit, of course, was declining sales of dairy products as more people shift to plant-based products like almond, soy, and oat “milk.”
Even more provocative would have been evidence about how raw dairy sales have helped revitalize a small segment of American dairy farming. The lawyer for the Ontario plaintiffs pointed out that 43 American states now allow some sort of raw dairy distribution and sales—via herdshares, direct-from-farm sales, retail sales—but he only made the argument in the context of demonstrating that raw milk can be sold safely. The lawyer didn’t discuss how dairy farming in many areas has been revitalized, for the benefit of farm families, the communities they live in, and their many happy and healthier customers.
I’m not sure such a tale would have had much impact on the lawyers arguing against raw dairy, on behalf of Canada, Ontario, and the Dairy Farmers of Ontario marketing cartel (the Canadian equivalent of Dean Foods—a monopolistic enterprise that controls the pricing, distribution, and marketing of raw milk in Ontario). It’s on a similar downward sloping sales cycle as Dean Foods, though perhaps not as steep. And like Dean Foods, it won’t entertain changes to its model, like promoting sales of raw dairy products to help spark renewed interest in the dairy category as a health food.
While the lawyer for raw milk farms and consumers made a good pitch in positioning raw milk as an increasingly safe and nutritious product, he and his clients are up against a legal system that has consistently ruled against raw dairy farmer Michael Schmidt since he began fighting Canadian restrictions in 1994; lawyers for Canada and Ontario used some of his previous cases as precedent to argue against change. And while the case is based on the plaintiffs being entitled to raw milk as a matter of conscience, the matter of safety seemed to underlie everything else.
The proverbial elephant in the courtroom was the judge, Shaun O’Brien. She’s been a judge for less than two years. According to a writeup about her from her law school, she is in her mid-40s, with three children, and is a runner and yoga enthusiast. She’s also been active professionally in promoting human rights, including women’s rights issues.
During the course of the nearly five days of hearings, she didn’t ask any questions I heard about raw milk’s health benefits, risks, or other dietary issues raised by the lawyers and public health experts that a mom might have had. Given all the previous court decisions against Michael Schmidt over the last 24 years, it’s difficult to imagine a Canadian court suddenly ruling in his favor, but then again, he’s never been before a young woman judge who has shown an interest in human rights.
Thanks to Raoul Bedi for providing reports on the courtroom proceedings in his comments.
“And while the case is based on the plaintiffs being entitled to raw milk as a matter of conscience, the matter of safety seemed to underlie everything else.”
Exactly, and that is what we are all essentially up against David… a germaphobic narrative that is being used to undermine freedom of choice and speach based on conscience and religious belief in regards to raw milk consumption, vaccination, lockdowns and the wearing of face masks et. etc. etc. There is no question in my mind that the wisdom in Benjamine Franklin’s statement is relavent today, irrespective of its context, “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
David, you are correct about the limited scope of the enquiry. However, the points you raised would be appropriate if the Ontario legislature were reconsidering its legislation. In the context of claims under a Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the points you raised about the declining dairy industry are unfortunately not relevant. Courts cannot transform themselves into wide-ranging commissions of inquiry.
oh, Courts can ‘transform demselves into wide-ranging commissions of inquiry’, alright … when some activist judge feels like it.
Good point, Karen. I was reacting more to the unchanging nature of the arguments put forth by the public health experts on raw milk safety, nutrition, and risk. These experts were from the U.S. and Canada. Laws in American states have changed dramatically. But these professionals never shift. I’d like to see them adjust, accept that there needs to be some adjustment in their approach to risk and on how complete rejection of raw milk based on safety affects the industry and health of people around them. I think they could do that without actually legislating. They are about “public health,” after all.
The real safety argument has to stop being raw vs pasteurized! The issue is clean vs dirty. Clean raw milk has always been more nutritious and healthy than dirty pasteurized milk. If the animals are healthy and the milk is clean, there is absolutely no reason or necessity to heat damage the milk. Pasteurization is the saddest justification that allows the sale of dirty milk from unhealthy, mistreated cows.
Was the safety of pasteurized dairy products ever raised. There are at least 84 deaths recorded at our Cdc database ( over three decades or so ). Those deaths were caused by pasteurized dairy products. Mostly listeria M.
Why didn’t the raw milk side give them some of their own medicine? If this was a fight over safety? SAFETY must have context. To everything in safety there are offsetting benefits.
Kind of like parachuting. When jumping from a burning aircraft parachutes are a very good choice and provide a safe alternative. When a mother chooses to provide safe raw milk to a child with asthma and saves Or greatly improves his life!!! That’s a great choice also.
The CDC has few if any deaths associated with raw dairy. The EU is buried in brilliant studies about the huge health benefits of raw milk.
The market protective greed component of this debate stinks to high heaven.
Mark , I share your concern that the Glencolton Farm’s legal team, lead by Lawyer Nementallah was mostly on the defensive the whole week. I was frustrated by the never-ending attacks on the qualifications and imagined biases of the Glencolton and Elbon Dairy’s Experts microbiologist Peg Coleman, Dr. Nadine Ijaz and Mr. Kennedy.
But it is also a question of style.
If you look at the True Hope case law i posted yesterday, the case was easily won by Canadian Natural Health lawyer, and legal rock star, Sean Buckley, who resides in Kamloops, BC, Canada. He totally knew how to go on the aggressive against Health Canada. He was totally comfortable with doing that and he easily succeeded. The arrogance of Health Canada, the trampling of people’s rights, the ignorance of true science, the old boy’s networks definitely have to be exposed simultaneous to obtaining some court ruling here and there. I can tell you that if Farm Lawyer Nementallah had invoked the True Hope Case during his oral submissions the Legal teams for the Ontario and the federal government would have shuddered in their shoes ( a polite way of saying the respondent side lawyers would have had to wear diapers during the entire hearing) .
Unfortunately, it is hard to find a lawyer in Canada with Karen Selick or Sean Buckley’s passion for Natural Health. There is always going to be a difference between a lawyer who does an assignment as a paying job and a lawyer with integrity and passion for the subject matter at hand.
I do not think it would have been practical to hire Sean Buckley again to be the lawyer for this case. I know Sean personally and I do think he would have won this case and he would have done exactly what you said and put the government lawyers on the defensive all week long instead of the other way around.
The Farm lawyers compensated for average oral submissions by making outstanding and painstaking written submissions. I still think there is a chance that the Glencolton’s farm’s team will just barely cross the finish line so I do not wish to say more about it yet. I suppose an appeal is still possible as well ?
Mr.Gumpert noted that Lawyer Joseph Cheng conceded nothing. Well he did at least concede the possibility of a concession to the farm side at the very end of his presentation. If anything, the Ontario government lawyer was much more aggressive and unyielding. At most he nodded for about 5 seconds to the possibility of the Judge finally demanding the government look into a new system of regulation for unpasteurized milk. Plus i noted already that the federal Trudeau government is NOT demanding their legal costs. The Ontario government is cold-bloodedly demanding their legal costs.
This case was not just about 2 farms or Michael Schmidt or Elisa Van der Hout, it was also about the millions of Canadian organic food consumers whose rights have been and continue to be trampled on by Health Canada and the agricultural ministries in question. What I am saying is that there is no question that this is case of great interest and importance to the public at large. So why is the Ontario Conservative government of Doug Ford so cruel and so bent on trying to bankrupt Glencolton farms after all these years ? Both levels of government have no problem getting out the monetary printing presses during this poorly managed Covid19 lockdown, so why can they not pay their own legal expenses here ?
Well said!
Mark, maybe not deaths, but lots of children with damaged kidneys as well as children who had strokes and permanent brain damage. All because of raw milk contaminated with E.Coli 0-57:H7.
I wish the Biblical references to “milk and honey” could be included when people argue about this in court or elsewhere. Surely there is some way to slip it into the argument.
I realize that not everyone believes the Bible, but many people do. In Bible times, lands flowing with milk and honey were considered one of God’s greatest blessings. This was before pasteurization. If their kids had been dropping dead, this would not have been considered a blessing.
this matter is public interest litigation. Neither provincial nor federal will get “costs”
It seems pretty simple: my body, my choice. I can buy raw chicken. It requires proper handling for safety and poses a potential health risk if not done so. Our governments are living in the stone age.
Mary…. not so fast
13 kids die every day from Asthma in the USA In the last five years I do it see any cases of ecoli causing HUS in the USA.
Please see the two peer reviewed studies Whitehead and Berge. Both show huge decreases on raw milk illness over the last sic years. Meanwhile, leafy greens are recalled all the time for ecoli.
Mary…. why not pick on lettuce??
Mark, the discussion is focusing on raw milk not lettuce, or did I miss something? You are skilled like Trump, shifting the focus to something else. The last horrific raw milk outbreak involving E.coli 0157:H7 was in June of 2018 in Tennessee. I count 2 years, not 5. It was a herdshare, 17 became ill, 7 hospitalized and 6 developed HUS all under the age of 4. One little boy suffered a stroke and was left with physical disabilities.
Mary,
Milk genomics scientists and EU milk researchers clearly show that raw milk with its raw whey proteins and 2500 bioactive and functional proteins, actively control and reduce virus infections…. like cold and flu.
Surely you would never suggest that children should be denied access to a food which protects against illness.
Then have the genomics group isolate the beneficial protein(s) and add them to a safer product for kids.
“Supply management harms animals”
“Cory Morgan writes that Canada’s Soviet-style supply management system encourages inhumane factory farms.”
https://www.westernstandardonline.com/2020/11/supply-management-harms-animals/
Without question, supply management “makes it nearly impossible for a small producer to do anything more than hobby production which is of course the entire intent of the system… Dairy options could vastly improve if only we got rid of our system of quotas as well”.
I totally disagree. I have met many small Canadian dairy operators that are thriving in Canada. They can grow but it takes time. If farmers are free to grow as fSt are they want…guess what ?? prices crash with over production. That’s been the USA tragic dairy story.
In the USA dairymen are trying hard to create some sort of organized Growth Management system. A free for all dairy system eats its own young.
Mary,
Researchers find that it is the “whole food” that contains the whole bioactive food that heals. Parts don’t work. Heating and killing does not work either.
Whey not just test raw milk using rapid test systems. Safety is assured with a very high level of confidence.
Mark, as a Canadian farmer who lived and participated in it, I’ve experiences two forms of supply management… The first form that had a mandate to protect the small family farm and the second form that abandoned that mandate in support of the CAFO model. There is a graveyard of small dairy farms across Canada that are a testimony to that fact. And on top of that fact, the reason why the sale of raw milk is flat out outlawed in Canada as opposed to the rest of the world, is because of a joint effort between the government mandated marketing board system and the government’s Food Health and Protection Agency… I am hoping that the Judge rules in favor of this constitutional challenge, it will be interesting to say the least to see how much traction such a ruling will get in the coming months and years.
problem with the dairy supply scheme in Canada, is : the govt. managed cartel dictates who shall win and who shall lose. Over 90 percent of the farms which were delivering milk when the milk marketing boards started – circa early 1970s – are not doing that now. So which is worse?
the milk marketing boards are now a racket … as ALWAYS happens in communism. Corruption / bribes are normal. People are sent to prison for simply co-operating to feed ourselves.
In British Columbia, the commies didn’t have the nerve to seize the means of production. Oh no, chickenshits that they are, the NeeDiPppers brought in the Natural Products Marketing Act 1976, which wrapped its insidious tentacles around production /distribution of certain foodstuffs. So they didn’t need the actual titles to the land, they just regulated them to death.
From 1976 to 1996 … when the Milk Industry Act was amended to get rid of the section allowing raw milk to be produced/ delivered under licence … selling REAL MILK was perfectly legal in British Columbia. The myth about raw milk making people sick, was dunned in to city people’s heads from 1988 on. A classic example of the govt. lying so as to run interference for its pets, the CAFO quota-holders, as the Campaign for REAL MILK educated consumers as to the difference between the dreck on retail shelves branded “homo milk” versus the good stuff
OK … so we agree that the beginning of the problem is : first world agriculture has gotten so good at producing quantities of milk, that there’s too much of it. My uncle Bill was there at the start of the quota system. He said that in the 1950s, dairymen on Vancouver Island regulated themselves. A Trade Association rather than the NannyState screwing it all up. There’s nothing the govt. can’t do, worse, and more expensively.
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Watson, when you stick to the facts, you are a very good communicator ,but when you start on your conspiracy theory BULLSHIT, your statements come across as the fiction it is. Stick to the facts Watson, AND, I will gladly take on that bet of yours, but, Ishould be forthcoming, I “Only Bet”, when I know w/o a doubt I will win, I am NOT a gambler, money is too hard to come by and leaves too easily,LOL!! But this one is a “No Brainer””, you’re on!!
Mary,
Raw milk provides health benefits because it is a whole food. If any of its parts are removed or destroyed…. it is no longer bioactive or a whole complete food.
If raw whey protein was removed it would still have bacteria in it. Heat destroys the beneficial activity of raw milk.
ref=em-share
A true life video worth watching to really understand the damage E.coli 0157:H7 can do to the human body. Raw milk has been contaminated with horrific pathogen–it is all about the cow poop. Since 2005, there have been 17 confirmed raw milk outbreaks involving E.coli 0157:H7 affecting 155 people, 67 were hospitalized, and 45 developed HUS. The majority of those who developed HUS were under 10. 7 of these outbreaks involved herd shares and 1 was a buying club.
How about data since 2010 and later That’s when RAWMI studies examined illness and data trends shows massive decline after 2915.
One of the biggest reasons that ecoli injuries consumers is because of the thin or missing mucus layers in the gut. These innate protective structures are damaged by antibiotics and modern highly processed foods.
When manure is removed from the milking process…. the odds of a ecoli incident are practically null. Raw milk institute standards, testing and training have achieved this.
Old data is an unfair review of the present risk analysis.
You will notice…. no deaths in the data.
Lettuce is the current violator. Has been for quite some time.
put those figures in context. Set them against the all-cause illnesses and deaths from other foodstuffs, which are perfectly legal in commerce.
Your obsession with harms attributed to raw milk … produced in any and every conditions, remember … is the very antithesis of “scientific’.
were you to compare harms from raw milk, against … say,just Sushi …the RAWMI self government program for REAL MILK comes off as the Gold Standard of how food should be handled
we’d take you seriously, Mary McGM. But we don’t because you’ve proved to be maliciously riding your one-trick pony round and round, as though such will eliminate the trauma suffered years ago
Include me out of your “issues”
Watson, When you manage to just stick to the “facts”, I have to agree with you whole heartedly.
Watson, There you go, sticking to facts and sounding very knowledgeable!!
Mary,
I watched the Raw Terror Vimeo video story. It is compelling. This story is exactly why I founded RAWMI.
This story was not about raw milk… it was about raw hamburger and doctors that did not have experience with treatment protocols very early on in the emerging ecoli pathogen story. This story was based on the early 1990s or earlier.
Doctors now treat HUS or pre HUS was blood transfusions and plasma replacement therapy with very good outcomes. Anti biotics are contraindicated as you know.
Treatment for STEC has come a long way since the Jack in the Box hamburger days.
Raw milk technology has traveled light years since 25-30 years ago. We can now test for Ecoli pathogens and get BAX PCR results in 12 hours.
We do that testing at Opdc RAW Farm.
We get test results back before any raw milk is sold.
Mary…. your story was part of how we pioneered our advanced food safety systems. Take heart that this has helped many kids to thrive on raw milk with out the worry of illness. ❤️????
Inactivation of Escherichia coli O157:H7 in biofilm on food-contact surfaces by sequential treatments of aqueous chlorine dioxide and drying
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25261831/
Chlorine Dioxide can be given to cows , it is volatile and has a short life in the body. Andreas Kalcker of Spain , did a study on 800 cows in Spain where he gave Chlorine Dioxide injections to some cows (using oral and intramuscular injection methods) instead of Vaccinations and compared their overall health and overall proneness to disease.
https://mmsforum.io/goto/technical-talk-chlorine-dioxide-solution-cds/21314-cds-injections-and-dairy-cows
There are many countries now that also use Chlorine Dioxide, only properly administered by a doctor, for any kind of bacterial infection in humans or animals. Unfortunately , the United States and Canada are not interested in this kind of research . No surprise there. This remedy is super cheap and costs pennies per dose in humans. No money there for Big Pharma either. They are more interested in jailing people who attempt to do this research .
Even so I do find some farm supply countries in the US and Canada selling chlorine dioxide kits to farmers to protect their cows from mastitis.
https://www.go2intl.com/bovine-mastitis-cows-treatment/
From my reading of the research, OUTSIDE THE US, on Chlorine Dioxide, it is my current understanding that most bacterial infections in most humans can be treated, by a properly licensed medical professional only, in a day or two ..
A second possible application of this research is providing an alternative to mass culling. I am horrified when i read of countries culling tens of millions of animals because of a virus. Denmark recently did so with their farmed mink population. And this has happened many times in China with chicken and pigs and other animals.
When we look at the economic damage from culling millions of animals or now locking down the economies of major Anglo Saxon economies for a year, it would seem worthwhile to investigate a solution, that can not be patented, and costs only pennies per dose .
From my reading of the research OUTSIDE THE US, inactivation of most viruses with Chlorine Dioxide, is not immediate as in the case of Bacteria, and may take several days or a week, for short term infections, with proper dosing.
For chronic infections from Hepatitis or AIDs , treatments may be needed for one or two months and the success rate is not 100%.
Mark , I think you have achieved an incredible level of safety in your work and do not need to rely on this work but it may be useful as a backup ? You have obviously mastered the the TERRAIN (as Beauchamp would term it ) so less need to be concerned about stray organisms and you now use the latest technology to rapid test for.
But i think it might be useful for farmers who run a less clean operation, not to RAWMI standards , to be made aware of this work ? I am not just talking about cows or any kind of animal milk.
I do not know if you can do private research on this topic i.e of E Coli infection ? If you do I would suggest being low key about it as you might attract considerable “hostility” from Big Pharma and the US FDA no matter who professionally you undertake this research .
As for Mary’s concern about E. Coli, the only way forward would be to find some country other than the US, Canada, Australia or the UK to do this research. As these 4 countries are probably the most captured on the whole earth by Big Pharma interests , and therefore the most obsessed with ineffective Vaccines, with tons of side effects , particularly on children, and harsh pharmaceuticals. Their media is equally captured by Big Pharma and so will never report on the alternatives.
Inventor Jim Humble , collected research data on infection from hundreds of thousands of people in Guyana and various African countries. Like that he saved himself about 10 years and $10 million or $50 million by avoiding the US FDA approval process. But he also had to move out of the USA because he feared for his personal safety as a result of his many successes with his research on Sodium Chlorite and Chlorine Dioxide.
Another area of interest would be megadosing with Vitamin C. I have not come across any research specifically about how Vitamin C injections could manage an E. Coli infection ? But i have seen enormous research going back to 1935 on how Vitamin C was used successfully to treat polio and most other viruses by Dr. Klenner and Dr. Cathcart and Dr. Riordan.
The best reference in the US would be http://www.doctoryourself.com which is edited by Dr. Andrew Saul of the Orthomolecular society . The Chinese , and particularly , Shanghai hospital have confirmed the use of Ascorbic acid in treating viral infection and have amazingly reduced their effective death rate from the Coronavirus to ZERO by March 2020. They now require all their doctors and nurses, who work in infection wards, to take 1 to 2 grams of Vitamin C per day , prophylactically. The Chinese have generously published their research on how they use Ascorbic Acid to treat Kovid19 but the US corporate media, Facebook and Google heavily censor this information. Basically , they have a formula by weight of the person but it work out to about 24 grams given intravenously for one or 2 days. At that point it appears that the majority of patients are able to be sent home.
Apart from receiving considerable advertising money from Big Pharma, I know that Google is now also heavily invested in Vaccine production directly now as well.
Like Chlorine Dioxide, Ascorbic acid is super cheap , and if it could provide an alternative to the culling of millions of animals (or humans for that matter if you believe the theory that Bill Gates is a Eugenicist ? ) for various viruses i.e bird flu, swine flu or other viral diseases , it seems like a crime not to consider it ?
DISCLAIMER: I have provided a short summary of areas of research by inventors and scientists outside the US for particularly low cost solutions that seem to find some difficulty ever finding the light of day . I have not performed this research myself. This is not to be construed as medical advice and it is clearly not US FDA approved and for the aforesaid reasons may never be approved even it works, in the majority of cases, and is relatively safe.
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I’m just getting up to speed on this recent challenge, is the ruling still to come or is the trial to resume at a later date? I read a number of articles on this Nov 2020 court challenge but haven’t seen a ruling