Raw Milk in the U.S. (Cow’s Milk): Regulation, Public Health Risk, Market Spillovers, and Policy Implications

Purpose and audience

This article provides a structured, evidence-based assessment of the regulatory, legal, public health, and market context surrounding raw (unpasteurized) cow’s milk in the United States. It is written as a reference document for industry stakeholders and professionals who routinely engage with regulatory, legal, and market-level dairy issues. The objective is to synthesize regulatory history, legal precedent, public health evidence, and market behavior in order to inform policy discussions that extend beyond individual consumer choice and consider industrywide economic and reputational effects. The analysis is intended for readers with familiarity with dairy markets, public health regulation, and policy analysis, and it emphasizes documented evidence and institutional context rather than advocacy-based claims. This paper does not attempt to adjudicate individual health claims or preferences associated with raw milk consumption beyond what is supported by established surveillance data, legal records, and institutional sources.

Historical foundations of milk safety regulation

Milk safety regulation in the United States emerged primarily as a public health response to documented disease risk rather than as an economic or industrial policy. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, milk was a frequent transmission vehicle for tuberculosis, brucellosis, typhoid fever, diphtheria, and other pathogens, particularly affecting infants and children. These risks were exacerbated by limited refrigeration, inconsistent sanitation practices, and urban population growth.

Municipal and state governments responded first, adopting sanitation and pasteurization requirements based on emerging bacteriological science. A pivotal national milestone was the 1924 Standard Milk Ordinance developed by the U.S. Public Health Service, which later evolved into the Grade “A” Pasteurized Milk Ordinance framework used by most states today (FDA, 2024a; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2020).

Pasteurization was adopted incrementally as evidence accumulated demonstrating that it substantially reduced pathogenic load without materially altering milk’s nutritional value. Historical public health literature consistently links pasteurization and milk sanitation standards to declines in milkborne illness and infant mortality (Anderson et al., 2022).

Federal and state roles in the modern regulatory structure

Federal authority over interstate commerce

At the federal level, raw milk regulation is limited in scope but binding. In 1987, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a final rule prohibiting the interstate sale or distribution of milk and milk products in final packaged form for direct human consumption unless pasteurized (21 C.F.R. § 1240.61). This rule rests on federal authority over interstate commerce and public health and does not regulate intrastate sales (Food and Drug Administration, 1987).

As a result, federal law does not constitute a nationwide ban on raw milk production or consumption. It establishes a uniform baseline for interstate movement only.

State authority over intrastate sales

States retain primary authority over whether and how raw milk may be sold within their borders. Consequently, the regulatory landscape is heterogeneous. Some states prohibit sales entirely, others allow limited on-farm sales or herd-share arrangements, and a smaller number permit retail sales under specified conditions. This variation is a defining feature of U.S. raw milk policy and a frequent source of public misunderstanding (FDA, 2024b).

Legal precedent and enforcement outcomes

Judicial outcomes in raw milk cases have been consistent over time. Courts have upheld federal authority to restrict interstate distribution of unpasteurized milk and have generally rejected attempts to circumvent those restrictions through cow-share or herd-share contractual arrangements (Congressional Research Service, 2021).

A case frequently cited in policy discussions and agency enforcement summaries, though not binding appellate precedent (that is, not a decision that higher courts are required to follow), is United States v. Allgyer (E.D. Pa. 2012). In that case, the court granted injunctive relief (an order requiring the defendant to cease the challenged conduct) after finding that the defendant’s distribution of raw milk across state lines violated federal law. While the decision was unpublished and fact-specific, and the defendant proceeded pro se (represented himself), the court’s reasoning reaffirmed the federal government’s authority to regulate interstate commerce in unpasteurized milk and rejected the argument that private contractual arrangements could override that authority (U.S. Department of Justice, 2012).

Consistent outcomes also appear in state-level litigation involving efforts to distribute raw milk through alternative ownership or labeling strategies. For example, in Oyarzo v. Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (2009), a dairy producer challenged state enforcement actions preventing the sale of fractional herd shares designed to provide shareholders access to raw milk. The court upheld the state’s authority to regulate such arrangements as part of its responsibility to oversee milk production and sales for public health purposes. Similarly, in Meadowsweet Dairy, LLC v. Hooker (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2010), the court found that a farm operating under a herd-share model was functioning as a milk plant and therefore subject to applicable permitting and regulatory requirements.

Taken together, these cases illustrate a consistent legal pattern:

• Federal restrictions on interstate raw milk distribution have proven durable.
• Intrastate legality remains primarily a state policy decision, subject to state police powers and public health authority.
• Courts have not recognized a constitutional right to sell or purchase raw milk in interstate commerce (David, 2012; Iowa State University Center for Agricultural Law and Taxation, 2013).

Consumption patterns and public health evidence

National survey data indicate that fewer than one percent of Americans consume raw milk in a given year, even in states where some form of access is legal. While this corresponds to a small absolute share of the U.S. population, raw milk consumption remains a niche behavior relative to pasteurized dairy products, and interest is concentrated within specific consumer segments (FDA, 2024b).

Public health surveillance consistently shows that raw milk carries a higher per-serving risk of foodborne illness than pasteurized milk. Outbreak investigations continue to associate raw milk consumption with pathogens such as Campylobacter, Salmonella, and Listeria monocytogenes, and more recent monitoring has identified detections associated with H5N1-infected dairy cattle in unpasteurized products (CDC, 2024; Weinstein et al., 2025).

From a policy perspective, the relevant consideration is the relative-risk differential between pasteurized and unpasteurized milk rather than the absolute number of consumers. The term “relative-risk differential” refers to the fact that, on a per-serving or per-consumer basis, raw milk consumption is associated with a substantially higher probability of illness compared with pasteurized milk. Even when overall consumption levels are low, this higher conditional risk increases the likelihood that a single adverse event will occur and stand out. This risk structure helps explain why public health agencies and regulators emphasize pasteurization in interstate commerce and why food safety incidents involving raw milk can generate disproportionate public concern and policy response relative to the size of the consuming population.

Market spillovers, recalls, and consumer confidence

Why spillovers matter for dairy policy

Food safety incidents can generate economic effects that extend beyond the specific firm or product involved. Consumers often update risk perceptions using incomplete or imperfect information, and media coverage may generalize perceived risk from a subset of products to an entire category. Dairy products, as frequently purchased household staples, are therefore particularly susceptible to this confidence channel under certain conditions.

Empirical food-economics literature documents that food safety events can depress demand and prices for uninvolved firms, with effects that may persist beyond the immediate recall period, depending on salience, media coverage, and consumer substitution patterns (Ren et al., 2025).

Dairy-specific examples of confidence effects

The examples below are not presented as evidence about raw milk consumption per se. Rather, they illustrate how food safety incidents within dairy and dairy-adjacent markets can affect consumer confidence, regulatory scrutiny, and market behavior beyond the specific product or firm involved. These cases are included to demonstrate the mechanisms through which safety events, even when limited in scope, can generate spillover effects at the category level, a dynamic that is relevant for evaluating policy decisions related to raw milk access and risk management.

Blue Bell ice cream listeriosis outbreak (2015)

A multistate listeriosis outbreak linked to Blue Bell products resulted in a nationwide recall and temporary plant closures. Subsequent reporting and financial disclosures indicate that the firm undertook prolonged efforts to rebuild consumer trust and regain market share, illustrating how dairy safety incidents can have lasting economic consequences even when confined to a single firm (CDC, 2015).

Infant formula recall and supply disruption (2022)

The 2022 infant formula recall triggered widespread shortages, emergency policy responses, and heightened scrutiny of dairy-adjacent supply chains. Although distinct from raw milk, this episode demonstrates how safety events in dairy-derived products can generate outsized market disruption and confidence effects extending beyond the directly affected products and firms (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services & Federal Trade Commission, 2024).

Raw milk and H5N1 detections (California, 2024)

Public health advisories and voluntary recalls related to H5N1 detections in retail raw milk prompted national media coverage. In response, public agencies repeatedly emphasized that pasteurized milk remained safe, underscoring the perceived risk of category-level spillovers and the need for reassurance even when the hazard is product-specific (California Department of Public Health, 2024a; 2024b).

Asymmetric risk and externalities

From an economic perspective, expanded access to unpasteurized milk can be characterized as involving an asymmetric payoff structure:

• Potential benefits, in this context, refer to perceived or realized benefits to participating consumers and producers, such as preference satisfaction, niche market demand, price premiums, or marketing differentiation, rather than to adjudicated health outcomes. These benefits are concentrated among a relatively small subset of consumers and producers who choose to participate in raw milk markets.
• As illustrated by the examples above, a negative event, even if rare, may impose external costs on the broader dairy industry through reputational effects, reduced consumer confidence, retailer risk-management responses, and increased regulatory scrutiny.

When such spillovers occur, they affect producers and processors who do not participate in raw milk markets, raising questions of externality management and risk allocation in policy design rather than solely questions of individual consumer choice.

Claims regarding intent and historical motivation

Public discourse increasingly asserts that pasteurization was imposed to suppress farming or that public health concerns were secondary to economic or industrial motives. The historical record does not substantiate these claims. Where documentation from the period in which pasteurization policies were adopted is available, regulatory rationales for milk pasteurization are consistently framed in terms of disease prevention, sanitation, and infant and child health rather than agricultural restructuring or market suppression.

Importantly, early milk sanitation and pasteurization policies emerged primarily through municipal ordinances and state public health regulation rather than through federal statute. As a result, the most relevant expressions of policy intent are found not in congressional committee reports, which are limited for this period, but in city health department reports, state board of health proceedings, and publications of the U.S. Public Health Service. These records repeatedly cite concerns about milkborne disease, urban sanitation failures, and elevated infant mortality as the motivating factors for pasteurization requirements.

Model ordinances and accompanying commentary, including early versions of the Standard Milk Ordinance developed by the U.S. Public Health Service, further reinforce this public health framing. These documents emphasize uniform sanitation standards, bacteriological safety, and consumer protection, and they do not articulate an intent to restrict farming activity or consolidate agricultural production.

While philanthropic organizations, including Rockefeller-affiliated institutions, funded public health research, demonstration projects, and nutrition initiatives in the early twentieth century, there is no documentary evidence that these organizations directed or controlled milk pasteurization policy. Regulatory outcomes instead reflect decentralized decision-making by local and state governments responding to contemporaneous public health challenges, informed by evolving scientific consensus (Rockefeller Foundation, 1933; Currier & Widness, 2018; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2020).

It is therefore analytically appropriate to distinguish between:

• Regulatory intent, which contemporaneous governance records link to public health objectives grounded in disease prevention and sanitation; and
• Distributional effects, which can influence compliance costs, production practices, and market structure over time without implying a singular or coordinated economic motive behind the original policy choices.

Policy implications for producers, processors, and policymakers

For industry stakeholders and policymakers, debates surrounding raw milk access raise broader questions about risk allocation, regulatory clarity, and market confidence that extend beyond individual consumer choice.

Several policy-relevant considerations follow:

• How should external costs from food safety incidents be considered in access decisions, including both direct costs (such as recalls, traceability requirements, enforcement expenses, and human health impacts) and indirect market effects (such as demand shocks, reputational spillovers, retailer risk-management responses, and changes in insurance availability)?
• How do retailer policies, liability insurance markets, and traceability and verification requirements respond to elevated perceived risk, particularly when that risk is associated with a subset of products rather than the dairy category as a whole?
• How can regulatory clarity and public communication reduce misinformation while maintaining consumer trust in dairy products, especially during safety events that stand out and attract heightened public and regulatory attention?

Absent statutory or regulatory change, the current federal–state framework is likely to persist, with states determining the legality and conditions of intrastate raw milk access and federal law maintaining restrictions on interstate raw milk sales. It is important to note, however, that many legal challenges to raw milk restrictions have been resolved at early procedural stages, including dismissals for failure to state a claim or failure to raise legally cognizable arguments. Courts generally do not advance legal theories on behalf of litigants, and observed outcomes therefore reflect both the strength of existing federal authority and the procedural posture and framing of cases brought to date. As such, the stability of the current framework reflects both the substance of existing law and how legal challenges have been brought and resolved to date, and it should not be interpreted as ruling out all possible future legal challenges under different arguments or procedural approaches.

Key takeaways

• Raw milk regulation in the United States developed primarily as a public health response to documented disease risk.
• Federal law restricts interstate raw milk sales; states govern intrastate access.
• Courts consistently uphold federal interstate authority over milk sales.
• Raw milk consumption remains rare but carries higher per-serving illness risk.
• Food safety incidents can generate spillover effects that affect the broader dairy industry, creating asymmetric risks relevant for policy design.

Appendix A. State-by-State Raw Milk Regulatory Categories (Intrastate Sales)

Interpretive note:
Federal law prohibits the interstate sale of raw (unpasteurized) milk for direct human consumption. The classifications below reflect the legality of intrastate raw milk sales or access mechanisms under state public health law frameworks, as summarized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Public Health Law Program (CDC, 2024). State statutes and regulations are subject to change, and enforcement practices may vary. This appendix should therefore be treated as a reference snapshot rather than a substitute for direct statutory or regulatory review.

Regulatory Category	States
Retail sales allowed	California; Connecticut; Maine; Nevada; New Mexico; Pennsylvania; South Carolina
On-farm sales allowed only	Arizona; Arkansas; Idaho; Illinois; Kansas; Massachusetts; Minnesota; Mississippi; New Hampshire; New York; North Carolina; Oregon; South Dakota; Texas; Utah; Vermont; Washington
Sales prohibited, but herd-share or cow-share access allowed	Alaska; Colorado; Michigan; Montana; Ohio; Oklahoma; Tennessee; Virginia
Sales prohibited (no legal intrastate access)	Alabama; Delaware; Florida; Georgia; Hawaii; Indiana; Iowa; Kentucky; Louisiana; Maryland; Missouri; Nebraska; New Jersey; North Dakota; Rhode Island; West Virginia; Wisconsin; Wyoming

Scope and limitations of state classifications

The state classifications presented above are based on nationally standardized public health law summaries and reflect the legal status of intrastate raw milk sales or access mechanisms at the time of the most recent comprehensive review. State statutes, administrative rules, and enforcement practices may change over time, and some states have considered or adopted modifications since the period covered by the underlying summaries. The classifications reflect state law as summarized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as of the most recent comprehensive update (2019) and should therefore be interpreted as a comparative policy reference rather than as a substitute for direct review of current state statutes or regulatory guidance. The classifications are intended to support analytical discussion of regulatory variation and market context, not to provide legal advice or compliance guidance.