Officials warn against drinking raw milk after baby dies from listeria

An babe successful New Mexico died of listeria, prompting the state's wellness section to pass residents against consuming earthy beverage and different earthy dairy products. 

The New Mexico Department of Health said successful a quality release that officials judge the newborn contracted listeria arsenic a effect of unpasteurized beverage their parent drank during pregnancy, though an nonstop origin cannot beryllium pinpointed. 

Listeria tin origin miscarriage, stillbirth, preterm commencement oregon fatal infections successful newborns, adjacent if the parent was lone mildly ill. 

The wellness section did not supply immoderate different accusation astir the kid oregon its parents. 

Raw milk and unpasteurized dairy tin airs a information to young children, large people, aged radical and anyone with a weakened immune system, nationalist wellness officials say.  

Listeria is the third-leading origin of decease from foodborne unwellness successful the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 1,250 radical successful the U.S. are infected with it each year, and astir 172 radical dice from it annually. 

Most beverage is pasteurized, which means it is concisely heated to a precocious capable somesthesia to termination germs. Raw oregon unpasteurized beverage tin incorporate aggregate pathogens that tin sicken people, including with listeria, influenza, tuberculosis, salmonella and E. coli, the wellness section said. 

Pasteurization has "greatly reduced milk-borne illnesses" since it was introduced successful the aboriginal 1900s, the CDC notes. Pasteurized milk  offers the aforesaid nutritional benefits "without the risks of earthy beverage consumption," the bureau says. 

New Mexico's Secretary of Agriculture, Jeff Witte, said the state's dairy producers "work hard to supply safe, wholesome products and pasteurization is simply a captious portion of that process."

"Consumers, peculiarly those astatine higher risk, are encouraged to take pasteurized dairy products to trim the hazard of superior foodborne illness," Witte said.

Florida officials issued a akin informing successful August 2025 aft 21 people, including six children, were sickened by E. coli and campylobacter bacteria linked to earthy beverage from the aforesaid farm.

The U.S. has seen rising involvement successful earthy milk, fueled by a scope of "wellness" influencers promoting it online. The Associated Press reported successful 2024 that income for the merchandise appeared to beryllium connected the rise. 

Edited by Paula Cohen

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