cholesterol lowering drugs


Cholesterol-lowering drugs given to middle-aged men cause a small reduction in heart attacks, but have not been shown to reducethe total risk of deathor the risk of hospitalizations. Hi, this is Larry Hobbs @ fatnews.com. This according to the cover story in BusinessWeek from January 17th, 2008 “Do Cholesterol Drugs Do Any Good?” “He did see a small reduction in the number of heart attacks for middle-aged men taking statins in clinical trials. But even for these men, there was no overall reduction in total deaths or illnesses requiring hospitalization–despite big reductions in ‘bad’ cholesterol,” the article notes. “Most people are taking something with no chance of benefitand a risk of harm,” says James Wright, MD. The story refers to an analysis by Dr. James M. Wright, Professor at the University of British Columbia and director of the Canadian government-funded Therapeutics Initiative, whose purpose is to analyze data on drugs and figure out how well they work. His contact information is listed at the end of this video. As far as I know niacin, vitamin B3, is the only cholesterol-lowering agent ever shown to reduce the risk of total mortality. Cholesterol-lowering drugs reduce the risk of dying from a heart attack but increase the risk of dying from cancer suicide and accidental death so that the overall risk of death is not reduced. When looking at the research on cholesterol-lowering drugs it is essential to look at data on TOTAL mortality, and not just …