Raw Farm CEO reportedly encouraged to apply for FDA position

Mark McAfee, the California uncooked milk producer who has been on the middle of a number of hen flu-related product remembers, says a transition crew for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has inspired him to use for a place on the Meals and Drug Administration.

McAfee, CEO of Fresno-based Uncooked Farm, LLC, instructed The Occasions that he has complied with the request and utilized for the place of “FDA advisor on uncooked milk coverage and requirements improvement.”

The recent raw milk recalls had been the results of optimistic checks for H5N1 bird flu among McAfee’s cows. His farms have since been quarantined, and the state has suspended all gross sales of uncooked milk and cream. Uncooked Farm has voluntarily issued remembers for all remaining milk and cream merchandise in shops.

McAfee’s farm can be concerned in a minimum of 11 lawsuits stemming from a salmonella outbreak that sickened 171 folks in California, and which occurred between October of final 12 months and Might of this 12 months, in line with Invoice Marler, a Seattle-area meals security lawyer.

When requested about McAfee doubtlessly being tapped for a federal meals advisory position, Marler wrote in an electronic mail: “Clown Automotive.”

Final month, President-elect Donald Trump introduced that he had chosen Kennedy to guide the U.S. Well being and Human Companies Division, which oversees the FDA, the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention, the Nationwide Institutes of Well being and different businesses.

Kennedy has been a vocal advocate for uncooked milk, and has criticized FDA coverage forbidding interstate gross sales of the product. In response to McAfee, Kennedy can be a client and buyer of Uncooked Farm milk.

McAfee mentioned he has not formally been chosen for the advisory position. Certainly, Kennedy’s personal nomination as Well being and Human Companies director still requires confirmation by the U.S. Senate.

The Occasions has reached out to the Trump transition crew and Kennedy’s Make America Wholesome Once more crew for remark, however has not but obtained a response.

McAfee is the most important producer of uncooked milk within the nation and maintains 1,800 dairy cows on two farms — one in Fresno, the opposite exterior Hanford.

His uncooked milk merchandise embody entire milk, cream, kefir and cheese — all of which will be bought in shops in California, however not over state strains..

Nonetheless, FDA rules don’t apply to his pet meals product line, which will be bought exterior California — albeit with warning labels noting that the merchandise usually are not meant for human consumption.

McAfee can be president of the Uncooked Milk Institute, an instructional and advocacy group designed to help dairy farmers involved in adopting requirements and strategies for uncooked milk manufacturing.

In an interview with The Occasions two weeks in the past, McAfee mentioned that as excited as he’s for Kennedy to alter the FDA’s coverage on uncooked milk, such a transfer must be carried out with deliberate care.

“I’m devoted to creating certain that no matter occurs, it isn’t chaotic, loopy, or only a free for all, however moderately very constructive with farmer coaching and testing and excessive requirements,” he mentioned. “I’m very involved in committing myself to serving to uncooked milk emerge as a constructive, excessive requirements, wholesome, fantastic, germinating, scrumptious meals.”

He famous that in 2021, Montana lawmakers handed a “meals freedom” regulation that legalized the unregulated sale of uncooked milk and uncooked milk merchandise. Quickly after, folks began to get sick.

McAfee mentioned he flew out to fulfill with uncooked milk dairy producers and helped them set up requirements that included coaching, testing and high quality management.

As an illustration, he famous one dairy farmer was cleansing his milk buckets with chlorine, which McAfee mentioned doesn’t tackle fat and biofilms.

“It was filthy,” he mentioned.

As a substitute, he confirmed the farmers methods to clear their tools with scorching water and cleaning soap.

“It’s a must to have requirements,” he mentioned.

McAfee’s milk is very regulated by the state of California, which performs frequent testing for food-illness pests resembling campylobacter, cryptosporidium, E. coli, listeria, brucella and salmonella and different bacterial sicknesses in his milk.

He mentioned in contrast to standard dairies the place the milk is pasteurized after it’s been collected, he’s required to check the cows for pathogens, and mentioned he solely milks disease-free cows.

He has an on-farm laboratory the place he checks for listeria, campylobacter, E. coli 0157H7 and salmonella in his bulk tanks and cows.

He mentioned his cows are meticulously cleaned earlier than they’re milked. And the milk is straight away shunted right into a speedy chiller that drops the milk’s temperature from 100 levels Fahrenheit to 35 levels Fahrenheit in about two minutes, he mentioned.

Then the milk stays at that temperature till delivered to shops.

Even so, consultants say micro organism can nonetheless contaminate milk — even when procured from a sparkling-clean udder. The FDA, CDC and different well being businesses say the general public ought to drink solely pasteurized milk.

Since 2006, Uncooked Farm — previously often known as Natural Pastures Dairy Firm — has been concerned in 13 remembers, together with the three bird-flu-related ones from final month.

The opposite remembers had been the results of bacterial contamination, together with E. coli, listeria, campylobacteria and salmonella. In some instances, folks grew to become severely ailing with hemolytic uremic syndrome — or kidney failure.

There was additionally a latest outbreak of salmonella poisoning from Uncooked Farm uncooked milk, which concerned a minimum of 171 folks “nearly all of which had been kids,” famous a report on the outbreak by the state’s Heart for Infectious Illnesses.

McAfee mentioned if he had been chosen for an advisory position on the FDA, he’d think about making a certification program, resembling these in place for natural farming that contain farmer training and coaching, for uncooked milk manufacturing.

He additionally mentioned he’d look into altering meals legal responsibility legal guidelines, “the place you possibly can’t go get 1,000,000 {dollars} for any individual that will get diarrhea for every week.”

McAfee mentioned the federal government ought to think about uncooked milk and different entire meals insurance coverage applications, just like the USDA’s crop insurance coverage program which offers for farmers whose fields and crops have been impacted by drought, flooding or hearth — or the newer milk insurance coverage program which offers cash for dairy farmers whose herds have been contaminated with hen flu.

“I’d advocate strongly that every one entire meals — together with possibly greens, eggs, carrots, by God, poor carrots — have meals legal responsibility insurance coverage… so folks can get that meals, as a result of proper now, insurance coverage or corporations saying, ‘Oh, you’re on the naughty record so no extra insurance coverage for you,’” he mentioned. “And so that you’re going to have shops with much less and fewer of those entire meals which are important to truly getting folks wholesome once more.”