A new study has explained why drinking raw milk can dangerously affect a person's health.

Over the past few years, government agencies and health experts have warned the public about the danger of consuming raw milk and unpasteurized products. Now, a new study has revealed that in the United States, unpasteurized products causes 45 times more hospitalizations and 840 times more illnesses compared pasteurized products.

Like Us on Facebook

Although unpasteurized products are consumed by a very small number of Americans - 1.6 percent eat unpasteurized cheese and 3.2 percent drink unpasteurized milk - they still contribute to nearly all of the dairy product consumption illnesses in the United States each year.

Raw milk refers to the milk of goats, cows, and other animals that have not gone through the process of pasteurization to kill harmful bacteria. Raw milk is said to have a lot of health benefits, but the authors of the study have expressed a contrary idea. They explained that natural food products have higher rates of foodborne illness than conventional ones.

Approximately 760 reported illnesses and 22 hospitalizations cases are linked to dairy product consumptions in the U.S. yearly. The two most common types of bacteria that contaminate these products are Campylobacter and Salmonella.

In the study, researchers included data from outbreaks associated with cheese and milk from cows. Even though the U.S. Food and Drug Administration inform has ed consumers that unpasteurized milk can pose a serious health risk, these products are still sold in some other states.

The authors said that consuming unpasteurized dairy products increases the public health risk, particularly among children since most of them consume raw milk. Although the majority of the population can recover from harmful bacteria in raw milk, some people may still face life-threatening consequences.

Abdominal pain, fever, vomiting, body ache, headache, and diarrhea are some of the common symptoms of consuming unpasteurized products. Also, these products are often found in the form of butter, cream, kefir, and yogurt.

The study is scheduled to be published in the journal of Emerging Infectious Diseases.