I'm sorry Diana feels that 

"This conversation about the risks in human donor milk makes me feel very sad!  I guess 
milk from a woman you know isn't necessarily better for a baby than milk from cows 
you've never met!"

The fact of the matter is that cows can get TB and all sorts of other diseases that can 
make cow's milk quite unsafe.  Having drunk fresh milk from cow's, goats, camels and 
even llama milk once --- there was always a risk of transmission in that act that I chose 
to do consciously.  I have never had a positive TB test, but I could have had one.  

There is a similar trade off between fresh cow's milk and pasteurized and even the double 
and triple pasteurization processes that destroy nutritional value. Quite a while back there 
was an expose (probably in the NY Times magazine section) about the organic milk 
industry --- whereby the very large companies were using extensive pasteurization to 
compensate for shipping milk across the country rather than the more expensive 
approach of going through local farms.  

We already do have human donor milk banks in place.  Just because we don't have the 
systems in place yet for routine screening, testing and if deemed necessary local 
processing of shared milk doesn't mean that this cannot be created.  Nor does it mean 
that local doctors can't now screen for all the diseases that could cause problem.  If we 
know what to screen for in the human donor milk banks, we know what to screen for in 
individual women.  If we know how to pasteurize cow's milk, we know how to pasteurize 
human milk and we do pasteurize it.

Best, Susan Burger.

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