Raw Milk: What Microbiologists Say Behind the Headlines About Haaland and RFK Jr.
The debate over raw milk got considerably louder in early 2026 when Manchester City footballer Erling Haaland disclosed that he drinks unpasteurized milk as part of his dietary regimen, and when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. - then U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services - made headlines as a prominent advocate. But the scientific arguments underlying the controversy have been building for years, shaped by a tug between well-established food safety evidence on one side and a growing, if still incomplete, body of research on potential health benefits on the other.
Applied Microbiology International's Under the Lens series turned its attention to this question by bringing together two microbiologists with different perspectives: Professor Nicola Holden from Scotland's Rural College, and Dr. Gil Domingue, who runs a data analysis consultancy. Both are members of AMI's Food Security Advisory Group. AMI Trustee Professor Emmanuel Adukwu conducted the interview.
What Pasteurization Does - and Does Not Do
Professor Holden's position starts from established microbiology: pasteurization inactivates potential food pathogens, and the process does so without meaningful changes to nutritional composition. The claim that raw milk is nutritionally superior to pasteurized milk is not supported by current evidence - the two microbiologists agreed on this point.
The food safety record is less ambiguous. In the United States, greater access to unpasteurized milk was associated with more foodborne illness outbreaks between 2013 and 2018. The pathogens that pasteurization targets - Salmonella, Listeria, E. coli O157:H7, and Campylobacter among them - are not theoretical risks. They cause serious illness, and they survive in raw milk. More raw milk means more exposure to those risks, statistically.
The Science That Makes the Case More Interesting
The part of the conversation that distinguishes it from a simple safety briefing is Domingue's acknowledgment that some recent research is genuinely intriguing. He pointed to studies from central Europe suggesting that exposure to raw farm milk in early childhood may be associated with lower rates of asthma and certain allergies - findings that have generated hypotheses about bioactive components such as microRNAs and specific fatty acids that might survive in raw milk but not in highly processed versions.
"We've mentioned in our conversation and original article, the role of fatty acids and microRNAs - microRNAs weren't heard of a few years back, but here they are and they're obviously now featuring as epigenetic regulators of gene expression," Domingue said. But he was careful about what this means in practice: "The papers we've cited from these studies have all stressed that raw dairy milk per se is dangerous or has a potential to be dangerous, and the more you drink of it, the more you increase the statistical chances of catching something."
Holden noted that one asthma society has referenced a trial examining whether minimally processed milk - not standard raw milk, but milk processed differently from conventional pasteurization - might affect asthma outcomes in young children. "So there is momentum building, but I think we're in the very, very early stages," she said. No intervention trial has yet established that raw milk consumption reduces allergy or asthma rates in a way that meets the evidentiary standards required for a clinical recommendation.
The Social Media Problem
Both researchers drew parallels to COVID-19 communication challenges, noting that anecdote spreads faster than data. A farming family whose children have fewer allergies is a compelling story. It is not evidence. And platforms that reward engagement over accuracy tend to circulate the story, not the caveat.
"That presents a challenge because as we know, trying to get to data and evidence takes a long time sometimes, but social media and media platforms move very quickly and respond very quickly, responding to whatever is driving the conversation at the time," Domingue said.
The scientific community faces a genuine communication challenge here. Saying "the safety risks are real but there may be something interesting in the bioactives that warrants study" is accurate but nuanced - and nuance competes badly against a famous athlete attributing his performance to an unprocessed diet.