Prevention

To reduce the risk of getting brucellosis, take these precautions:

• Avoid unpasteurized dairy foods. In recent years in the United States, few cases of brucellosis have been linked to raw dairy products from domestic herds. Still, it's best to avoid unpasteurized milk, cheese and ice cream, no matter what their origin. If you're traveling to other countries, avoid all raw dairy foods.
• Cook meat thoroughly. Cook a whole cut of meat until it reaches an internal temperature of 145 F (63 C) and let it rest for at least three minutes — a medium doneness. Cook ground meat to 160 F (71 C) — well done. Cook all poultry, including ground poultry, to 165 F (74 C). When traveling outside of the United States, avoid undercooked meats.
• Wear gloves. If you're a veterinarian, farmer, hunter or slaughterhouse worker, wear rubber gloves when handling sick or dead animals or animal tissue or when assisting an animal giving birth.
• Take safety precautions in high-risk workplaces. If you work in a laboratory, handle all specimens under appropriate biosafety conditions. Slaughterhouses should also follow protective measures, such as separating the killing floor from other processing areas and use of protective clothing.
• Vaccinate domestic animals. In the United States, an aggressive vaccination program has nearly eliminated brucellosis in livestock herds. Because the brucellosis vaccine is live, it can cause disease in people. Anyone who has an accidental needle stick while vaccinating an animal should be treated.