What's a little pus going to hurt?
March 31st 2010 07:14
By now everyone has heard that milk contains pus. If you haven't, well now you have. If your like me, when I hear things like this I always wonder just how that happens. I looked into it and here's how it gets in there.
First a short, simple biology lesson to set the stage. Just like humans, a cow must get pregnant to produce milk (You would be surprised how many people believe cows normally produce milk and must be milked for their health). The calf is taken away after birth and the cow is constantly hooked up to a milking machine and milked until she starts to dry up. Then the cycle is repeated: pregnancy, birth, milking, repeat.
Being hooked up to a machine so often causes infections and can lead to a painful inflammation called mastitis. Just as when we get an infection (picture a cut finger infected and oozing pus), the white blood cells in cows try to fight off the infection, leading to pus. But don't worry, no more than 750,000 cells per milliliter is allowed, and it's white, so you'll never notice it floating around in your glass of milk.
Oh, if your wondering what happens to all those calves that are taken away, most of them become veal. But that's a story for another day.
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