New cholesterol guidelines

Although cholesterol lowering statin drugs have been demonstrated to reduce the risk of a heart attack fatality, the benefits are however very minimal. For instance, the CARE trial showed that the odds of escaping death from a heart attack in five years for a patient with manifest heart disease was 94.3%, in comparison to 95.4% among those with statin treatment. The WOSCOPS trial, which is based on people without manifest heart disease but had high cholesterol, showed only a mere 0.04% increase in survival rate among those under statin drugs.

Furthermore, the side effects of the drugs have not been properly addressed. In most animal experiments, the statins as well as most other cholesterol-lowering drugs, caused cancer. This could be relevant in the case of human beings as well since breast cancer was noted more often in those under statin treatment in the CARE trial.

The EXCEL trial demonstrated a slight increase in total mortality among the treatment group after one year. However, the trial was discontinued before more observations could be made.

Source: Arteriosclerosis 1991; 11: 1619-1635. British Medical Journal, May 28, 2001