The Complete Patient

It's difficult not to feel badly for Mark McAfee and his family. Together they run Organic Pastures Dairy Farm, a 300-cow farm near Fresno, CA, that has become California's largest provider of raw milk. As I detail in my latest BusinessWeek.com column, he's essentially been put out of business while the regulators search high and low for E.coli bacteria that might have made four children sick.

The problem is that, after a week, the 15 to 20 government inspectors who have been hanging around his farm have found only the good bacteria that are a part of raw milk (which isn't pasteurized or homogenized), and no sign of E.coli. They are frustrated, so they keep Organic Pastures shuttered tight and continue searching. Each day that goes by costs the McAfee family thousands, and tarnishes his carefully cultivated brand.

These are honest citizens who seem to have tried hard to do everything right in setting up their raw milk operation. But the spinach scare has spilled over into raw milk, and it seems as if the McAfees have been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.

This is a developing situation, and as I say in the column, Mark McAfee seems determined to fight Big Brother. For more info, take a look at www.organicpastures.com.