May 23, 2004 Toronto Sun by CONNIE WOODCOCK

Dying For A Hamburger: Modern Meat Processing And The Epidemic Of Alzheimer's Disease is a murder mystery whose victims are you and I and anyone else who has ever eaten any meat product that has passed through a meat packing plant. That includes just about everyone, even vegans, when you consider the number of places gelatine turns up -- gummi worms, capsules, jelly beans.

Dr. Murray Waldman, a Toronto coroner, and writer/broadcaster Marjorie Lamb set out to show links between mad cow disease (bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE) and Alzheimer's, the disease that affects one in 10 people over age 65 and which has become our society's biggest fear.

If it's true, it should be putting big, bold headlines on the front pages of all North American newspapers, but it hasn't. The reason is it's rather far-fetched.

The two argue that Alzheimer's is a modern plague, virtually unknown until the 20th century and that it's a prion disease -- prions are malformed proteins -- related to BSE and its human counterpart, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease -- all possibly spread by cattle byproducts. Meat packing plants, they argue, are also an early 20th century phenomenon and since we know that contaminated meat from cows with BSE will give humans Creutzfeldt-Jakob, it's not hard to see the connection.

Low rates of these diseases occur in places that do little or no meat processing -- India, for example, where the cow is sacred, they say.

It all sounds so plausible. But you have to remember that the evidence presented doesn't come from the laboratory, it comes from a survey of available information. They don't have any proof that Alzheimer's is a prion disease. BSE and Creutzfeldt-Jakob are, though, and it's known that they can be spread by the spinal cord material or other parts of a single diseased cow getting into the food chain.

Still, whether you buy their arguments or not, it's hard to disagree with their conclusions, especially after our own brush with mad cow in the past year. They believe that since these diseases can be spread by close contact among animals, it's time to stop raising cows in feed lots; that everyone should stop feeding all kinds of animal protein to cattle and other noncarnivorous species; that meat processors should stop "batching" meat for hamburgers and sausages so that the meat in any one burger is all from the same cow; and that every cow should be tested for BSE when slaughtered.

A test exists that would add about 5 cents to the price of a pound of beef, they claim. "There is no good reason why such a program could not be instituted in North America immediately," they write. "The 'don't look, don't find' policy that exists now is both wrong and dangerous."

If it sounds as though they're getting a little hysterical, they think there's good reason -- that Alzheimer's and Creutzfeldt-Jakob are "the greatest public health challenge of the 21st century. Control of these diseases, and particularly Alzheimer's disease, is pivotal to the entire future of our society."

Since Dying For A Hamburger was released, some scientists have argued with the authors' conclusions, particularly whether Alzheimer's is a prion disease. Majority opinion seems to be it isn't.

But whether they're right or wrong, we already know one thing: That mad cow is a dreadful disease and if there's anything we could do to eliminate it -- by banning meat protein in any kind of feed, testing every single cow that darkens a packing house door -- we ought to be doing it.

Still, Alzheimer's and hamburgers? Let's face it, if it's true, it's way too late for us to worry about it.