Cabot Please Stop Using rBGH!

I learned awhile ago now at my the co-op that Vermont's major cheese maker, Cabot Creamery, is one of the last holdouts still using milk from cows treated rBGH (recumbent bovine growth hormone).

What is rBGH? It is a growth hormone used on cows to increase their milk production, but it comes with a host of problems for both the cow who is made to take it, and the consumers who ingest it through their milk.

rBGH apparently causes great harm and misery for cows. According to a panel of animal health experts appointed by the Canadian Veterinary Medicine Association, it causes mastitis, lameness, hoof disorders, and a significantly shorter life span. Being a nursing mom, I have great empathy for any creature that is made to overproduce milk. It is painful enough when my daughter goes on a nursing strike-- I can't imagine this kind of pain, day after day. Not to mention the fact that if a cow does get mastitis, or another infection due to rBGH, they are given antibiotics, which ends up in the milk and contributes to the growing problem of antibiotic resistant bacteria.

There is mounting evidence that rBGH causes an increased cancer risk in humans, specifically breast and colon cancer. Read this for more information. Is this another reason for the increase in cancer rates in the U.S., especially breast cancer?

rBGH is banned in almost every industrialized nation because of these human health and animal safety concerns (again another example of how the U.S. is falling behind--).

Most dairy farms have reacted to consumer concern, and are only accepting milk from farmers who pledge not to use rBGH. You can see these labels on all sorts of brands of conventional milk, such as Hood, Booth Brothers and others. Stoneyfield Farms has a great record of environmental stewardship and activism on this issue (see the link for more ways to take action against rBGH).

I want to support our local creamery. Organic cheese is seriously expensive! I recently spent way too much money on cheese at the co-op, and it is almost gone. I absolutely adore cheese, and my family eats it in droves. What can we do?

Write Cabot and tell them to stop using rBGH milk in their cheese. Robert Stammer is the CEO, and the address is: Cabot Creamery, One Home Farm Way, Montpelier, Vermont 05602. Their parent company is Agri-mark, their CEO is Paul Johnston, at PO Box 5800, Lawerence, Massachusetts 01842.

Thanks to Hunger Mountain Co-op for this contact information and basic information about rBGH.

I will miss my Cabot sharp cheddar. Sigh.