Is rGBH still injected into dairy cattle?

[Ilsa]

I'm going to do a thread on another website (mostly women) about dangerous/unknown risks stuff the FDA says is "okay".

Any other topics besides rGBH would be helpful. (I did a search here on DU, but came up empty for rGBH.)

[havocmom]

1. Ilsa, I will ask Havocdad about it when he comes home this evening.

Let me know what you find out on the other site.

[htuttle]

2. You bet, and it's still prohibited to label milk 'rBGH free'

But the grocery store can put up a sign next to the milk indicating what brands have no rBGH. Mine does.

[Massacure]

4. Can you name any of the brands off the top of your head?

[tanyev]

6. I always buy Horizon organic milk.

[ragin_acadian]

14. me too.

i also noticed that the expiration date on my cartons indicate that Horizon lasts about two weeks longer than Borden or other hormone laced milk.

does organic milk last longer, or do they just supply the stores quicker?

[tanyev]

17. I think it's because they are ultra-pasteurized.

The only organic brand I've ever had trouble with is Promised Land Dairy. Three times now their milk has started to smell funny or taste funny, well before the date on the bottle. I read somewhere that they are a fundie company. I wonder if they just pray over the milk instead of pasteurizing it.

[ragin_acadian]

18. too funny!

i can just imagine it: "Lawd, protect this here milk from tha' evils of spontaneous generation"

i switched to European cheeses and butters too, to get away from Monsanto - i don't know if it is psychological or not, but i feel a lot healthier than i have in years.

[Squeech]

19. Ultra-pasteurized

means that a chemical preservative is added.

Pasteurization is a heat treatment-- milk is heated to a temperature that kills pathogens.

[htuttle]

7. 'Swiss Valley Farms' (PA) and 'Pure Milk Company' (TX)

Both were sued by Monstanto for labeling their milk 'rBGH Free'. My local food coop carries Swiss Valley Farms milk.

[leftchick]

9. Organic Valley

Stoneyfield Farms and Horizon Dairy products. Harris Teeter here in the south also now has a line of their store brand organics. I imagine a lot more store chains will be doing this.

[acmejack]

3. Yes it is

Good reason to go with organic milk.

[livinginphotographs]

5. As far as I know, yes.

Since 1990.

That could explain why girls are, um, "developing" a hell of a lot faster.

[sybylla]

8. I've already heard that blamed on using plastics in the microwave

Apparently there is a chemical released from some plastics when you microwave them that mimics hormones.

Don't ask for a source. It's just something I read in the media about 5 years ago. It would explain why my neice, born in 1979 before rGBH was used regularly, began "developing" at about the age of 9 and had her first period when she was 10. Her mother microwaved everything when she was little.

[livinginphotographs]

12. Well, mine is just a theory too.

So I don't really have a source either.

I just know that the few times I've been back to my old high school, the freshman girls look NOTHING like when I was there. And several co-workers of mine have wondered the same thing.

[shockra]

13. I was just reading about this.

http://www.greaterthings.com/Editorial/puberty_meat.htm

Lower Puberty Age a Function of Hormones in Meat & Dairy
October 27, 1999

Dear Editor,

A recent Knight Ridder News Service reported that the decreased age for puberty in girls "could be related to polycarbonate plastic products such as baby bottles, food-can linings and food storage containers."

A much more profound contributor to the diminished age of puberty for both girls and boys is the hormones they get by eating meat and dairy products -- a dietary trend which significantly increases with the affluence of society, helped along by the scientific advances enabling the meat and dairy industries to pump their animals full of hormones.

In his book "Diet for a New America," the Baskin and Robbins fortune heir apparent turned Vegan, John Robbins, cites data showing the change in the age of puberty for Japanese girls from 16.5 years in 1875 to 12.2 years in 1974. He says this is attributable to them changing from their traditional vegetable and rice diet to a "a diet much higher in animal fat."

Even in its optimal performance, the human body can be affected by ingested hormones and hormone look-alike chemicals. (A scary thought when you think of the adrenaline-heavy "fight/flight" response evoked in animals at the time of slaughter.)

<snip>

Dear David,

Actually...the change was even more dramatic than JR realized. In 1950 the average Japanese consumed 5.5 pounds of milk and dairy... By 1975 that number had increased to 117.4 pounds. During that 25 year period, the average 12-year-old girl gained 19 pounds, grew 4 1/2 inches, and the average age of menarche went from 15.2 years to 12.2 years.

[livinginphotographs]

15. Good article.

Thanks!

[shockra]

25. Even better.

This is one doctor's report (Saenz de Rodriguez) that was discussed in Diet for a New America:

http://www.miqel.com/text/taddmature.html

Premature Sexual Maturation of Human Children

In 1982 the February issue of the Journal of the Puerto Rican Medical Association reported on a growing number of cases of premature sexual development of children, which included cases of children from one to five years old, male and female, with enlarged breasts, accelerated puberty, vaginal bleeding in five year old girls, and other similar problems. If this happened to one of your children, how would you feel?<1>

They discovered that when they took these children off meat and fresh milk, the symptoms would often regress. According to the report, it was "clearly observed in 97% of the cases that the appearance of abnormal breast tissue was related to the consumption of whole milk in the infant group and to the consumption of local whole milk, poultry and beef in the older group. Obviously, regulations regarding livestock are not as well enforced in Puerto Rico as in other parts of the United States, so the dose might have been higher, but these substances are also present in varying quantities in all meat, egg and dairy products in the continental United States.<2>

<snip>

Even in the continental United States, we are seeing more and more premature sexual development in our children. Along with this, doctors are also seeing an expanding assortment of sexual abberations. Other countries are also experiencing the same trend. Analysis of the problem in Britain resulted in the determination that hormone traces in the meat of chemically fattened livestock are causing British school girls to mature sexually at least three years earlier than in the past. We will discuss estrogenic chemicals later.

Invariably, doctors (not knowing what the problem really is) blame the problem on a dysfunction of the child's endocrine system, which is not the case at all...

[BurtWorm]

10. I was just reading about a reporter named Jane Akre who was fired

from a Fox station in Tampa because she refused to water down a report about the dangers of rBGH because her "news" director didn't want to risk losing ad revenue from Monsanto and local supermarkets.

I don't know if it still is, but I think so. I was just asking myself the same question after reading this in a book (from 2002 or 2003, I think) called "Into the Buzzsaw," which chronicles cases of censorship in the US media.

[Ilsa]

20. Here's an article on that.

I found it this morning after watching The Corporation last night.

http://www.rense.com/health/rgbh.htm

Reporters Fired For
Telling The Truth About
RGBH Milk Hormone

Rachel's Environment & Health Weekly
4-14-98

Two veteran news reporters for Fox TV in Tampa, Florida have been fired for refusing to water down an investigative report on Monsanto's controversial milk hormone, rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone). Monsanto's rBGH is a genetically-engineered hormone sold to dairy farmers, who inject it into their cows every two weeks to increase milk production. In recent years, evidence has accumulated indicating that rBGH may promote cancer in humans who drink milk from rBGH-treated cows. It is the link between rBGH and cancer that Fox TV tried hardest to remove from the story.

SNIP

[Jackpine Radical]

11. I think you might want to try searching for BST

Bovine Stereotropin. The industry renamed BGH to sidestep all the bad press it had accumulated.

[Ilsa]

21. Thanks. It figures they'd change the name to prevent

close association with an item that has gotten bad press.

I'm surprised the pharmas haven't tried to do a name hange on Vioxx, etc.

[flvegan]

16. Yes. Between 5% and 30% of all dairy cattle receive it.

For more searching, try using rBGH, as it's often referred to that way.

[Deja Q]

22. Yes they do. They sell regular milk and the no-rBGH/rBST milk. and

buy the latter only. It lasts until or after the expiration date and tastes better. (much less pus in it either as hormones only stress and hurt the cows' internal organs in the process to make more moo juice...)

[hexola]

23. My dairy farmer friends use it....

Economics being the driving force...

[Ilsa]

24. Thanks Everyone! I really appreciate it.

I'm passing on this tidbit and the Jane Akre/ Tampa Fox story to some friends on another site.

[tanyev]

26. The DVD "The Corporation" goes into detail on the Jane Akre story.

In addition to all the other enlightening stuff on the DVD.