The milk here already says something to the effect of "rGBH treatment in cows has not been shown to cause any effects in milk." Obviously not verbatim, but this is really similar.

Moo

Cripes I cannot figure out what the issue is here. Is it that labels say too much, or too little? Or that hormones do or don't matter?

I am curious to know how much this would increase labelling costs. It doesn't seem any different than makers who tout the benefits of included "health" ingredients that aren't FDA tested printing their disclaimer.

I admit, I'm torn. On one hand, it seems unfair that producers who choose not to label or who actually use rGBH are presented as unhealthy when the FDA has no problem with it. On the other hand, it should be up to the consumer to decide what they believe is safe and not safe, and advertising hormone-free is just a way of informing the consumer (just as if Lance had put "PCA peanut free" on their snacks). Running to the legislature to mandate the disclaimer hints that they want someone else to do their advertising and publicity for them - they should man up like the HFCS folks and make their own stuff.

As for me and my house, we use rGBH-free.

@nbs2: How is it presenting them as unhealthy to allow OTHER brands to labels themselves as not using rBGH?

@humphrmi: Not the best written article or source.

But I think it says the bill would have required anyone labeling their product as rBGH-free to also include a statement that says the FDA declared rBGH safe.

Which makes no sense. The industrial milk lobby must have bought off a lot of politicians to make a bill that requires a product to declare that a chemical not contain in the product is safe. It's would have been very misleading as people wouldn't understand why a non-rBGH product is telling them that rBGH is safe.

I live in Garden City, KS. Feel sorry for me.

rGHB is banned in other countries because they have determined it's not safe. It's not banned here because the milk lobby has convinced the people who decide such things that they can ignore the evidence that it's unsafe.

If the rGBH-using producers think they can win this fight on the FDA's word alone, then why not stamp something like "rGBH-treated" on all their products? Put it in fancy gold lettering set on a star, and "FDA approved" underneath. If the mere inclusion of an "rGBH-free" label is so unfairly damaging to the competition, then the competition can just fight right back with their own label. How could any legislator not see this?

Go Kansas Governor!

@Ratty: I've seen chicken labeled:

Hormone-free!*

*by law, chicken may not be fed hormones.

I was like, "Srsly?"

I've also seen chickens labeled "vegetarian-fed" which raises oh-so-many questions.

@VA_White: uhm, source? First off, it's rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone) not rGHB. Secondly, to my knowledge they have banned rBGH because it is inhumane for the cows to be forced to continuously lactate. I don't think they at all found that the milk from these cows is unsafe for human consumption.

Folks....it's rBGH (recombinant Bovine growth hormone) not rGBH.

@Eyebrows McGee (on Twitter: LPetelle): wait... so... bastards!!!

@saya: Which is funny, just scrolling through the comments i see rBGH, rGBH rGHB.

This article isn't obvious. It's a good thing the Governor of Kansas vetoed that.

It basically would have required the label to say:

"This milk is hormone free, not that there is anything wrong with hormones."

I don't get it. Isn't hormone-free a good thing? Why would you need to require a label? Wouldn't said label be a selling point?

@Eyebrows McGee (on Twitter: LPetelle): I've seen that too!

I just wonder "what's the point of you telling me?"

I want those little cows in the pic.

*slaps own hand* No more spending!!!

Reading comprehension, people:

The label, on hormone free milk, would have required producers to put a label on the milk basically declaring "this is hormone free, but it's pointless, hormones are fine!".

Really, there's a ton of evidence that hormone laden milk and poultry is pushing our children (and especially girls) to develop secondary sex charictaristics (breasts, menstruation, facial hair, etc.) at earlier and earlier ages.

So... vetoing this law was a good thing.

@nbs2: Only tangentially related, but, how come companies are always complaining about cost of compliance when they're asked to put something on their label, or make their label fit some standard? They're always happily redesigning their labels for purposes of advertising or tricking people with the shrink-ray.

@Eyebrows McGee (on Twitter: LPetelle): We have to thin out those vegetarians some how. Feeding them to chickens seems fitting...........

@WiglyWorm: Of course correlation != causation, we'll need many more years to prove a difinitive link (or lack thereof) etc., etc.

As others have stated, this is basically something that the dairies who DO use rBGH lobby for, basically hindering the producers who don't use the hormone from distinguishing their product - and in my opinion, it is one of many stellar examples of how modern American capitalism works.

Step 1: Build your business up until you can afford a lot of lobbyists.
Step 2: Lobby the government to regulate your competition out of business.
Step 3: ???
Step 4: PROFIT!

There's no good reason to include the sneaky footnote, given the regulations other countries have against the hormone and the increasing number of people interested in avoiding hormones and endocrine disrupters in their food. It's just agribusiness trying to keep us in line.

@Ratty: You see this kind of stuff on a lot of fishing gear. California requires a standardized lead warning on anything containing lead, so most manufacturers just put it on everything if they make one product that contains lead.

Funny to see the warning on packages of plastic worms, hard plastic lures, steel hooks, flourocarbon line, etc.

@Eyebrows McGee (on Twitter: LPetelle): I think on that note i'm totally going to start marketing some products as "never contains ground up children*"

*Industry standard prevents the use of children as an ingredient

Or "100% Uranium Free*"

*Uranium is not approved by the FDA

@jokono: It's not a law that would have required them to label milk that was produced by rBGH-free cows. It was a law to require producers that DID want to label their milk that way to state that there is nothing wrong with rBGH milk. Monsanto, who makes the hormone, have been trying to promote these laws all over the place in order to undermine the market for milk that doesn't use their product.

We have that same disclaimer in California, also I have never once seen milk that didn't say "Not from cows treated with RBGH*

*Studies have not found any difference between milk from cows treated with RBGH and from non-treated cows."

I paraphrased the second part because i don't remember the exact words.

I actually have a question; I see milk labelled like this already. Isn't there already a Fed regulation requiring it? If not, why are companies already doing it?

A better disclaimer would be "Monsanto thinks hormones in your milk is just fine and spent a ton of money to get this put on your milk bottle".

@Applekid: Because it's a dishonest rhetorical tactic to try to undermine support for requiring the standard in the first place. Companies don't like standard labels because it means they have to compete on substantive quality rather than marketing.

@ElizabethD:
OOOH! I have one!

It came in the mail...it was a little freebie squeezy stress cow!

I loooooove milk.

The label sounds contradictory to me.

@Corporate_guy: I'm starting to get it. I guess that depends on whether rBGH is *actually* safe or not. If someone wants to say "Hey! Pay more for this milk because it is completely free of this chemical that's totally safe" then I'd want to know that.

@saya: If you read the Wikipedia entry on this they have a lot of documentation on the controversy. It's not approved for use in many other countries including Japan, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and many European countries. You're right that much of the concern is over animal health/welfare, but there are also some controversial claims of human health concerns.

[en.wikipedia.org]

@WiglyWorm: There's also corrolation that it may be the overuse of processed soy as a filler in food products, but there's noy soy warning label.

It'd be nice to get unbiased research but it seems everyone has a horse in this race.

@West Coast Secessionist: Yeah, that's what I see. I'm in nevada and it's all California produce and dairy here. I've never actually found RBGH milk.

guh-huk! that's our governor! Were happy your going to take her from us, enjoy her and her silly antics!

bet you can't wait to play her sons board game "don't drop the soap" can ya?

@Canino: And shotglasses. It kind of freaks me out to see that warning on a shotglass.

@Mike8813: I live three hours east and have had the unfortunate experience of staying two days there last year. My apologies.

Seriously though, I sometimes wish my city was less of a a shithole, and then I realize that at least I'm not living in Garden City.

@Corporate_guy: But the milk lobbyists already won this in a lot of states, where it is required to label non-rBGH milk as saying that the FDA found rBGH and non-rBGH milks to be equivalent in laboratory testing.

@johnva:

On the other hand, it should be up to the consumer to decide what they believe is safe and not safe

Are you sure? And you're OK with the impact that has upon the rest of the product safety testing world? So which consumer stood up and said that lead was unsafe? Or DDT?

@VA_White: recombinant gamma-Hydroxybutric acid? You've managed to synthesize the date rape drug using bacteria? Awesome!

@sporks: I got a good chuckle out of that, thanks. So you're close to Wichita then? At least you have a Buffalo Wild Wings. (drool...)

rBGH is a recombinant BOVINE growth hormone. From cows and for cows, the protein has no biological activity in humans. Also, even if it were in the milk product, the protein goes first to your stomach where the sole and exclusive purpose of proteases is to degrade (inactivate, breakdown) protein. As a protein, it's too large to be absorbed by your gut epithelium as is, and if it were in your blood stream it would be rejected as a foreign antigen and your immune system would destroy it.

In Pennsylvania, the dairy industry wrote a bill in 2007 that would have made it illegal to label hormone-free milk as ... hormone-free. Yes, you read that right. Now, obviously I'm not putting it in the exact words ... no one was going to say their milk was "hormone-free," since that's a misnomer, because rBGH milk technically doesn't have the hormones in it. But it would have made it illegal for anyone to put any labels to differentiate between milk from cows that had or hadn't been treated with rBGH.

The consumer-loving dairy industry just wanted to prevent "confusion" among consumers, since of course, there's no difference, right?

Unfortunately for them, the bill didn't pass. And consumer confusion lives on.

@opsomath: Thing that really bothers me is that if Monsanto and other giant agribusiness congloms thought they could sell more milk by advertising the presence of rGBH they would do so in a heartbeat! They are a bunch of hypocrites!

@opsomath: Some states require that not the feds.

@humphrmi: I believe that was Rachel Carson. At least regarding DDT.

I see your point, but what if you take away the risk assessment perspective, and just leave it as consumers choosing food products for whatever reasons they want, why shouldn't companies be allowed to accurately describe product characteristics? Just because advertising 'no transfat/rGBH/artificial colors/HFCS in this product!' sends a message that those things are bad isn't a good enough reason to restrict accurate advertising.

I see it as parallel with kosher certifications. There are some people who are interested in knowing if the food contains certain ingredients and has been through certain processes. Advertising that fact with an OU or K or alternate seal doesn't imply anything bad about products that don't have it - just that they are different. So why can't milk that goes through certain rGBH-free processes be free to advertise that?

@Mike8813: I only feel a little more sorry for you than I do myself, cause I'm in Wichita!