A BORDER health shop owner has rejected calls to ban raw milk products.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Olive Health Foods owner David Redcliffe spoke out after the Victorian government requested a federal investigation into labelling of unpasteurised milk and a possible ban on its sale following the death of a toddler earlier this week.
Mr Redcliffe has sold raw goats’ milk for 29 years and said a number of his customers drank the milk and had never fallen ill.
He also has other types of unpasteurised milk on his shelves.
“I think there are risks and also potential benefits because raw food products are easier to digest,” he said.
“I come across a lot of people who tolerate them better.”
Mr Redcliffe said he had even consumed the raw milk himself and liked the taste.
“I wouldn’t advise people against it,” he said.
“We point out a lot of people do eat it and we point out that it’s also not for human consumption.”
He said most of the customers who bought his raw milk products, drank them.
Mr Redcliffe said rather than banning the product, it could undergo stricter testing and more education could be provided to consumers about the risks.
“But I think the warning is there and it is up to the individual,” he said.
“There are risks in all the things we eat and all the things we do.”
Mr Redcliffe said the call to ban the products was an overreaction.
He said it should be the consumer’s decision whether they drink raw milk products if they were aware of the risks.
“It does depend on what the evidence says about the source of the bacterial contamination,” he said.
“We don’t know the whole story.
“In the old days people drank directly from the dairy.”
Up to 50 bottles of raw goats’ milk are bought by customers of Olive Health Foods every week as well as up to 20 other raw milk products.
Mr Redcliffe expected the latest tragedy would affect raw product sales, but he wasn’t worried.
“I’m more concerned about the risk to people’s health if that is the issue,” he said.
Mr Redcliffe stocks a bath milk but not the Mountain View Farm bath milk brand that was recalled yesterday because it was linked to the death of a toddler.
