WHOLE FOODS PULLS RAW MILK FROM SHELVES
Whole Foods has announced that they will be removing all raw milk from their shelves in California, Washington, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. The reason given is that Whole Foods’ insurance company has decided it will not cover liability for perceived health issues with raw milk until a satisfactory nationwide safety policy for raw milk has been demonstrated. It is important to stress the fact that this action is not a reaction to any safety problem caused by raw milk.

It is EXTREMELY important to let Whole Foods know how you feel about this decision by emailing them at http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/company/contact_submit.php. Then patronize smaller health foods stores and markets that still carry raw milk. Not only has Whole Foods stopped providing Nature’s perfect food, they have created a severe financial hardship for the farmers who in good faith have invested in raw milk production for Whole Foods markets. If you phone the dairy that has provided raw milk to Whole Foods, they will be able to provide you with the names of stores that still carry it.

Below is my testimony from the hearing for the bill to legalize raw milk in Wisconsin. It was an exciting day for raw milk. Over 700 people gathered to show their support of this bill. People traveled from as far as France to testify! The testimonies went for over 10 hours. THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN–LEGALIZE RAW MILK NOW!

My name is Kathryne Pirtle and I am a professional clarinetist with a national career. I play with the Orion Ensemble, which tours throughout North America and am Principal Clarinetist of the Lake Forest Symphony. I also often perform with the Lyric Opera, Ravinia Festival and Chicago Symphony Orchestras. I am 52 years old and at age 45 I nearly died from a severe digestive disorder. I had suffered from chronic pain for 25 years. However, I had followed all the healthy high-fiber, low-fat eating dictates that we are told are necessary to insure good health for my entire life. Excellent health is very important to me. I ate lots of salads, grains, fresh fruits and vegetables, a little meat, eggs and dairy and only vegetable oils—no butter.

However, this way of eating was making me very ill. Besides being in chronic pain, at 42 I began experiencing acid reflux, and I developed a severe digestive disorder at 45 which caused me to have chronic diarrhea. I was going to the bathroom about 15 times a day! At that time, I was eating only vegetables, fruit, meat and olive oil. I did not know what to eat or if I would survive.

Luckily, I learned of the work of Dr. Weston A. Price and the Weston A. Price Foundation. Dr. Price was baffled by the amount of chronic illness in his patients and traveled worldwide to see if there were cultures that had perfect health. He found 14 cultures that were immune to disease and had wonderful dental and physical health. Many of these cultures depended on raw milk for their high degree of wellness. Their diets all included ample amounts of nutrient-dense foods that were from animals eating their natural diets.

I began eating these foods—raw milk, cream, butter, bone broth soups, cultured foods, cod liver oil and pastured meats and eggs. I began to consume about a quart of raw milk every day along with lots of raw butter and cream. Gradually, not only did my digestive problems and chronic pain disappear, I have become healthier than ever before as I continue to eat these God-given unprocessed foods.

Not only did raw milk help to save my life, there is a growing worldwide movement of people who are discovering its important health benefits. I have given over 55 seminars across the country, written an important book called Performance without Pain, and given radio and television interviews sharing how nutrient-dense foods like raw milk can heal and build optimal health. I have spoken to the autism and mental health communities; to people suffering from food intolerances like gluten; to families and their children about maximizing learning, concentration and mental health through nutrient-dense foods; to performing artists and athletes and to people who are struggling with chronic illness. My book, website and seminars are an example of the effective information that is spreading throughout the world on helping people overcome the severe health challenges that we are facing today that cannot be ignored and need real solutions—NOW!

Our children cannot wait any longer for real food to be available to each and every person. We have hospitals being built for very sick children who need real food now. The time is now—we cannot wait any longer. We need raw milk now. It must be legalized in every state. The future of our children’s well-being depends on this!

Kathryne Pirtle

Who would have guessed that out of the 500 people who attended the hearing for the legalization of raw milk in Eau Claire, Wisconsin on Wednesday, March 10 and out of the 176 people who testified–the only negative information on raw milk came from a mere handful of paid representatives from food safety! It was a great day for raw milk!

People came from as far as France to testify to the enormous attributes of raw milk–it’s ability to heal and support optimal health when handled in a responsible manner by small family farmers and the ridiculous laws that have shamefully prevented people’s access to this perfect food. It was clear from the testimonies given by doctors, farmers, families, and young and old people from all walks of life–that people are demanding that their right to choose the foods they need to live healthfully and the legalization of raw milk is serious business.

Testimony from France discussed how in their country you could buy raw milk from vending machines! France has a long history of the safe consumption of raw milk, cream and butter. It was rather embarrassing to note how draconian our laws have been when the French have enjoyed raw milk for centuries. Dr. Ted Beals gave poignant testimony on the possibility of illnesses from raw milk being very small when proper care is taken in handling. He pointed out that you are more likely to be injured from the drive to pick up your raw milk than from drinking it! He also stated that sickness from raw milk can almost be totally obliterated if any people who are ill abstain from its handling in the milking and bottling and even purchasing phase. In fact he suggested that we pay raw milk employees who are sick  to stay home and do not send sick family members to pick up the milk!

There was powerful testimony from Scott Trautmen, a well known Wisconsin pasture dairy farmer, that represented the experiences of small farmers in Wisconsin whose farms are in danger of being shut down.  He talked of the pervasive, inexcusable criminal invasion by the Department of Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) of his farm and his passionate business to provide healthy foods to people in need.  This criminal activity is reminiscent of  the worst kinds of governmental harassment in the history of our country.

I talked about how raw milk was key in the many of the diets of healthy populations that Dr. Weston A. Price studied and that it was instrumental in saving my life. I also discussed the growing movement of people who are finding raw milk to be critical to their family’s health and that through the Weston A. Price Foundation and resources like my lectures, book, and website, people all around the world are understanding the need to return to nutrient-dense traditional foods.

Hours and hours of testimony were heard–starting at 10AM going on and on late into the evening! Countless people discussed over and over again that raw milk was necessary to sustain the health of the small family farm and that of the consumers of this traditional food, and that governmental intrusion needs to end immediately. We can easily access foods that have been known to cause illness from factory farms in our grocery stores and fast food restaurants–we can even freely eat raw foods like sushi if we so choose–it is time to have free access to raw milk!

Thankfully, Wisconsin’s legislators were all ears! They sat openly listening to all the testimony–the room was filled with the undeniable force of positive change. The hats worn all through each aisle read “MILK FREEDOM!”

THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN–LEGALIZE RAW MILK NOW!!

Best in Health,

Kathryne Pirtle

By gollies, the top executives of health insurance corporations are not giving up without a fight! To paraphrase every high school football coach who ever lived, “When the going gets ugly, the ugly get going.”

During the past several months, the Barons of Wall Street had established themselves as the vilest and most reviled corporate team in the land. They’ve been lavishing bonuses on themselves even as their firms continue to benefit from government bailout measures and even as ordinary Americans continue to struggle with the economic collapse caused by the bankers’ arrogance and avarice. Wall Streeters were widely considered a shoo-in to take the coveted Corporate Greedhead Trophy this year — but, holy cow, what a comeback bid we’re now seeing from the Giants of Insurance!

Let’s recap their amazing charge: Last week, the news broke that America’s five largest health insurance companies (United Health, Wellpoint, Aetna, Humana and Cigna) had scored record profits in 2009, totaling $12.2 billion. This was a stunning 56 percent hike over the previous year, a drive made all the more impressive by the fact that these gains came during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.

As American families struggled financially last year, Team Insurance was able to boot 2.7 million more people out of their private health plans, leaving those folks in the corporate dust. In an even slicker, hidden-ball play, three of the five giants cut the proportion of premiums they spent on their customers’ medical care, shifting those premium dollars into corporate salaries, profits and administrative overhead. Even Wall Street’s Barons had to shake their heads in disbelief and marvel at the audacity of that play.

By the way, buried in that increase for the insurers’ administrative overhead was a little statistic that often gets overlooked: lobbying expenses. The Big Five spent $16.8 million last year to lobby against comprehensive reform of our health care system. You youngsters should take note of that, for such attention to detail is what builds a corporate champion.

The recession-time surge in insurance profits, the shedding of older and sicker customers, the lateral of more premium dollars into things like executive pay — these maneuvers alone would’ve moved health insurance up in the top tier of ugly industries. But then the industry ratcheted up its game another notch. One of Wellpoint’s subsidiaries heaved a “Hail Mary” pass that shocked everyone and catapulted insurance into a serious contender for the Greedhead Trophy.
In the same week that Wellpoint acknowledged that its 2009 profits were up by $2.3 billion over the previous year (a 91 percent increase), its Anthem Blue Cross subsidiary in California caused a sensation by seeking to raise the premiums on its customers’ policies by as much as 39 percent this year.

As befits a true Greedhead striver, Wellpoint neatly stiffed critics by asserting that this price hike was necessitated by the general increase in America’s health care costs — never mind that the corporation’s rise in premiums is actually 10 times more than the rise in the overall cost of health care. What a move!

However, whether Wellpoint’s daring California score will be allowed is in question, for there was a flag on the play. State insurance zebras are questioning the legitimacy of the increase, causing a company executive to argue heatedly that while tens of thousands of customers would indeed be socked with a 39 percent jump in their premiums, the average rate increase would be a mere 25 percent, so the play should be OK.

Come on, sports fans, ya gotta give ’em some style points just for trying to get away with that.

Still, can the upstart Insurance Giants hope to out-ugly the more-sophisticated Wall Street Barons? The great thing about Corporate America is that competition is always fierce for the national greedhead title, and insurance is now in the running. As sportscasters can tell you: Only time will tell, it’s not over ’til it’s over, tomorrow’s another day, winners never quit/quitters never win, wait’ll next year, and it’s deja vu all over again.

Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of the new book, “Swim Against the Current: Even a Dead Fish Can Go With the Flow.” (Wiley, March 2008) He publishes the monthly “Hightower Lowdown,” co-edited by Phillip

For more information on building health and healing with nutrient-dense foods see Performance without Pain and our new e-book on healing acid reflux.

Best in health,

Kathryne Pirtle



WHOLE FOODS PROMOTES MILITANT VEGETARIAN AGENDA

Has the Upscale Market Outlived Its Usefulness?

WASHINGTON, DC. February 3, 2010:  Whole Foods Markets has launched a nationwide “Health Starts Here” marketing scheme that endorses a lowfat, vegetarian diet, with promises that the diet will “improve health easily and naturally.” The plan promotes the books and private business ventures of Joel Fuhrman, MD, and Rip Esselstyn, both of whom worked with Whole Foods to formulate the new guidelines. Customers now receive a pamphlet urging them to adopt a lowfat, plant-based diet and to cut back or completely eliminate animal foods.  Many Whole Foods stores no longer sell books advocating consumption of meat, eggs and dairy products.

The plan will feature new Aggregate Nutrient Density Index (ANDI) labels for foods in the store; the index is designed to make plant foods to appear “nutrient dense” by favoring various phytonutrients in plants and ignoring many vitamins and minerals essential to health. “Whole Foods has stacked the deck against animal foods by choosing ANDI parameters that do not include a host of key nutrients, such as vitamins A, D and K, DHA, EPA arachidonic acid, taurine, iodine, biotin, pantothenic acid, and vital minerals like sodium, chloride, potassium, sulfur, phosphorus, copper, manganese, boron, molybdenum and chromium,” says Sally Fallon Morell, president of the Weston A. Price Foundation. “Many of the phytochemicals that Fuhrman includes in the index he developed for Whole Foods play no essential role in the body and may even be harmful.”

“Animal foods like meat, liver, butter, whole milk and eggs contain ten to one hundred times more vitamins and minerals than plant foods,” says Fallon Morell. “Plant foods add variety and interest to the human diet but in most circumstances do not qualify as ‘nutrient-dense’ foods.”

“For years before becoming deathly ill, I followed the dietary suggestions in the Whole Foods plan,” said Kathryne Pirtle, author of Performance without Pain. “I ate large amounts of organic salads, vegetables and fruits, lots of whole grains, only a little meat and no animal fat. I had chronic pain for twenty-five years on this diet, then acid reflux, then a serious inflammation in my spine followed by chronic diarrhea. Without switching to nutrient-dense animal foods, including eggs, butter and whole dairy products, not only would I have lost my national career as a performing artist, I would have died at forty-five years old! I am not alone in this story of ill health from a lowfat, plant-based diet, which does not supply a person with enough nutrients to be healthy and can be very damaging to the intestinal tract.”

“Consumers can send a message about Whole Foods’ misinformed scheme by voting with their feet,” says Fallon Morell.  “Most major grocery store chains now carry basic organic staples and a larger array of organic fruits and vegetables than Whole Foods markets. And citizens should purchase seasonal produce  and their meat, eggs and dairy products directly from farmers engaged in non-toxic and grass-based farming. It’s not appropriate for Whole Foods to promote a scheme that has no scientific basis and that bulldozes their customers towards the higher profit items in their stores.” The local chapters of the Weston A. Price Foundation help consumers connect with farmers raising animal foods in humane, healthy and ecologically friendly fashion.

“The growing emphasis on plant-based diets deficient in animal protein also serves to promote soy foods as both meat and dairy substitutes,” says Kaayla T. Daniel, PhD, CCN, author of The Whole Soy Story: The Dark Side of America’s Favorite Health Food.   “Soy is not only one of the top eight allergens but has been linked in more than sixty years of studies to malnutrition, digestive distress, thyroid dysfunction, reproductive disorders including infertility, and even cancer, especially breast cancer.”

“Low fat patients are my most unhealthy patients,” says John P. Salerno, MD, a board certified family physician from New York City. “The reason we are spiraling into diabetes and obesity is because of the lowfat concept developed by the U.S government decades ago. Lowfat diets have a low nutrient base, and phytonutrients in vegetables cannot be properly absorbed without fat.”

Fallon Morell cites recent studies from Europe showing that lowfat diets promote weight gain in both children and adults, and also contribute to infertility. A meta-analysis published January, 2010 in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found no significant evidence that saturated fat consumption is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.

“Whole Foods CEO John Mackay has stated that eating animal fats amounts to an addiction. But in fact, animal fats are essential for good health,” says Fallon Morell. “The nutrients in animal fats, such as vitamins A, D and K, arachidonic acid, DHA, choline, cholesterol and saturated fat, are critical for brain function. In the misguided war against cholesterol and saturated fat, we have created an epidemic of learning disorders in the young and mental decline in the elderly.”

“Perhaps the vegetarian diet has affected the thinking powers of Whole Foods management,” says Fallon Morell. “It’s time for the stockholders to insist on leadership devoted to increasing customer base, not promoting a personal vegetarian agenda.”

The Weston A. Price Foundation is a 501C3 nutrition education foundation with the mission of disseminating accurate, science-based information on diet and health. Named after nutrition pioneer Weston A. Price, DDS, author of the book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, the Washington, DC-based Foundation publishes a quarterly journal for over 12,000 members, supports 400 local chapters worldwide and hosts a yearly conference. The Foundation headquarters phone number is (202) 363-4394, westonaprice.org, info@westonaprice.org.

Comments about the Whole Foods Health Starts Here scheme can be emailed to customer.questions@wholefoods.com .

CONTACT

Kimberly Hartke, Publicist, the Weston A. Price Foundation

703-860-2711, 703-675-5557 press@westonaprice.org

Raw milk and freedom to healthy food won a major victory in Canada last Thursday.  After years of suffering multiple raids to his bio-dynamic farm and being illegally charged with the unlawful distribution of raw milk to his cow share members, Micheal Schmidt’s case has finally been cleared. It has been declared that people who want to purchase raw milk from Michael’s farm through the cow share program can legally do this as Michael is not selling the milk to the public, but to people who knowingly and willingly desire to be part owners of the cows and foods they provide–that people entered in a legal contract that allows them access to the foods from the animals that they own.

The right to choose the foods you eat is an unalienable right.  This ruling will give great momentum to the legality of purchasing healthy food through these type of contracts.

Huge Victory for Michael Schmidt As Canadian Judge Rules Cow Shares Outside Regulators’ Jurisdiction

By David Gumperts–from his blog The Complete Patient
Author of The Raw Milk Revolution

Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 12:18PM

In a decision that took Ontario Judge Paul Kowarsky two-and-a-half hours to read, and sounded much of the time like a thoroughly researched legal treatise, raw dairy farmer Michael Schmidt was exonerated on 19 counts of violating the province’s milk laws.

At first, the judge sounded as if he was going to rule against Schmidt,when he said several times he had “no authority” to pronounce on legislation. His role, he said, was to determine “whether offenses occurred.” He then went through each of the 19 counts against Michael Schmidt, which stem from offenses that first occurred in 1994, when his Glencolton Farm was first raided by authorities.

He then went through the account of how two undercover agents from the Ontario Ministry of Health in 2006 acquired milk products from Michael Schmidt. The circumstances around that operation wound up influencing the judge’s ruling when he decided he had “reasonable doubt” about whether the acquisition of $6 worth of raw milk cheese from Michael Schmidt constituted a sale. That decision was essential to allowing the judge to then rule on whether cow shares are subject to Ontario milk laws.

In the end, the judge determined that cow shares are outside regulatory oversight based on the following:

• That legislation is subject to a “dynamic” based on cultural, social, and historical factors. In other words, raw milk doesn’t pose the same dangers it might have been seen to pose in the 1930s, when much of Ontario’s dairy legislation was passed.
• That Michael Schmidt wasn’t “marketing” the cow shares. “There was no advertising and sale (of raw milk) to the general public…Cow shares are a legitimate private enterprise that does not constitute marketing in Ontario.”
• Perhaps most intriguing, that “the people who are permitted to buy the milk are fully informed” via a special booklet, identification cards, regular newsletters, and other steps Michael Schmidt took on behalf of his members.  “There is no evidence of any illness” in all the years Michael Schmidt has been distributing raw milk, he observed, and tests by the regulatory authorities never found any evidence of pathogens.

Judge Kowarsky obviously gave the case a huge amount of time and consideration. He In addition to researching other cases, he reviewed cow share procedures in the United States and Australia,and rules regarding sale of raw milk in Europe. It made me wish that the New York state judge who ruled against Meadow Sweet Dairy on a very broad definition of the term “consumer,” might have done the same kind of analysis.

Max Kane, the owner of a Wisconsin raw dairy buyers club facing legal problems of his own, said, “I want that judge for my case.” He drove overnight from Wisconsin to Newmarket to hear the court decision. Another American raw milk “celebrity” in attendance was Tim Wightman of the Farm-to-Consumer Foundation.

Michael Schmidt was all smiles afterwards. “It’s an incredible relief,” he told me. Especially given the judge’s observation that the amount of potential fines had Michael been found guilty could have been “astronomical.”

Dear Friends,

For the continued success of our local Wisconsin small family farms who produce our wonderful raw milk and some of the highest quality foods available to us please join the Wisconsin Raw Milk Alliance on Facebook. Pass this on to all of your friends!

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=229022049416&ref=ts

Wisconsin Alliance for Raw Milk

WARM is Wisconsin farmers and consumers, and those from surrounding states, who are for the freedom and right to choose raw milk and other foods we want to consume to maintain and restore our health. We are for the right and freedom to farm the land and to share and trade in the bounty of our crops without government or corporate interferences.

To our continued strength in our right to choose healthy foods!

Merry Christmas!

Best in health,
Kathryne Pirtle

This video represents today’s issues of our continued access to foods that we choose to nourish our own bodies and provide for our children.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O2pZfiBJs0 We cannot underestimate the importance of our involvement in insuring that our basic right to choose the quality of the very foods that go into our mouth is respected.

Please become involved in the Weston A. Price Foundation and join the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund.

For more information on building health and healing with nutrient-dense foods see Performance without Pain and our new e-book on healing acid reflux.

Best in health,

Kathryne Pirtle