Re: fake milk?

> >http://scribalterror.blogs.com/scribal_terror/2008/09/frothy-snails.html
> > The adulteration of London milk and cream in the nineteenth century
(an=
d
> > before) is presented in gruesome detail by John Timbs in Curiosities
of
> > London (1855)


A more or less contem****ary practice on the left side of the pond came
up for a mention in the New York Times a few days ago:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/opinion/30wilson.html


> Interesting article. =A0Not the most appetizing practice I have read.
> My question was the concerning the rumor of current (2008) practice by
> dairy farmers. =A0Any info on that?

I hadn't heard that any such adulteration is currently done by
USAmerican dairy farmers, nor that we have any cow shortage.  However,
the latest melamine scandal in the PRC, though as far as I can tell
largely intramural, seems bound to spread and mutate in the way of all
urban legends...  Milk, with its association with babies and all the
resulting emotional ramifications, is especially vulnerable to such
rumors.

Here is probably more than anyone not in the business would want to
know about dairying in the US in recent years:
http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/MannUsda/viewDo***entInfo.do?do***entID=3D1=
103
(a good conspiracy theorist would of course respond that it's just
disinformation They (tm) planted...)

--Joe