NEW YORK, April 5: The beef industry is under attack. No, not from vegetarians. From Robin Cook.His new medical thriller, Toxin, is a searing indictment of the beef industry in particular, and American society in general, where corporate greed takes precedence over ethics and even human life.Kim Reggis is a top cardiac surgeon whose busy career has resulted in a divorce. But he dotes on his 9-year-old daughter, Becky, and takes her to a hamburger joint at her insistence. A big mistake. She contracts a virulent strain of E coli bacteria. He is frantic to save her, but every test and treatment he feels necessary is denied by a managed care company as "not cost-effective". His offer to pay makes no difference.When Becky's heart stops, an angry and desperate Kim rips open. Kim charges like a bull to the hamburger joint and the burger patties manufacturer, demanding to know how the burger Becky ate became contaminated with the bacteria. But, of course, the powerful beef industry knows how to dealwith a troublemaker like Kim. He soon finds himself fighting off assassins.Cook's graphic depiction of a slaughter house's brutal and unsanitary "kill floor" where cows, including diseased ones, are decapitated and eviscerated is by far more gruesome and horrifying than any hospital scenes Cook has ever written. It is shocking enough to turn anyone into an instant vegetarian. The author is a physician, and he is obviously infuriated by the fact that hundreds of children become sick every year from E Coli-tainted food produced by some manufacturers who put profit over public health.His fury is so great that it radiates from every page like heat. Toxin is one heavyweight of a book that packs plenty of punches. The most socially significant work Cook has ever done.
