Arly,

I am curious as to why you feel canned milk is preferable to fresh.  Do
you mean that fresh milk, newly expressed and Pasteurized would be more
dangerous than canned milk (if so, why?) or that, in a natural disaster,
fresh milk would be more dangerous because it could not be kept
refridgerated?

Thanks!
Darillyn

Hi Darillyn:

One of the problems with other animals' milks as compared to our own is
their high curd tension.  Cows' milk is higher than goats', but human milk
makes more tender, flocculent, fragile curds, leading to greater
digestibility, less irritation, and greater ease of passage through the
intestinal tract.  One of the ways to reduce curd tension (to turn that
rubbery,indigestible mass into smaller, rubbery masses) is to apply heat.
The longer and higher heat of canning is much more efficacious for this
than the brief heat of pasteurization.  It has been determined that the
higher the curd tension, the more gastrointestinal bleeding suffered by the
infant.  My concerns with fresh, pasteurized milk are largely mechanical,
primarily (1) gastrointestinal bleeding and (2) gastrointestinal blockage.

On a minor scale, there is also the issue of  bacterial or viral
contamination, caused by inappropriate handling by the distributor,
retailer, and consumer.  I have observed milk standing on loading docks and
next to the refrigerator case in the market and in institutions before
being put back into refrigeration.  Canned milk is protected from some of
the mishandling errors because it does not require refrigeration and has a
longer shelf life; also, it is commonly purchased in smaller units, thus
reducing the length of exposure to pathogens between the time the package
is opened and the time the product is completely used.

So, between the choices of fresh, pasteurized cow's milk and canned cow's
milk, I would identify canned as less dangerous.

I believe the principle is still important in fresh, pasteurized versus
canned goat's milk, even though the curd tension is lower in goat's than
cow's milk.

Fresh, unpasteurized goat's milk can of course pose dangers related to the
possibility of bacterial infection in the goat; some infant and child
deaths in the Pacific Northwest were related to consumption of raw goat's
milk when I lived there.

In a disaster (natural or man-made) which interrupted distribution of
foodstuffs, I would hope to have a goat or cow or some other animal
available capable of giving fresh milk, in order to have something to feed
a baby if human milk were not available. If it were possible in such a
situation, I would boil the milk.

Arly