Friday 18 July 2014

Statins...another big push!

Statins hit the news again on both sides of the pond.  Here in the UK we have the headline

'Statins: Millions more to get drugs in controversial plans'

Doctors have been told to offer millions more people the cholesterol lowering drug.  As many as 4 in 10 adults could be given statins...just in case!

want to read the whole story.....http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-28352290

I've written my view on statins many times, so rather than repeat myself take a look at the suggested clips and before you jump at the chance of taking a statin, be your own doctor and do your research. What's really in it for you if you take statins, What can you do yourself and what is really in it for big pharma - follow the money!  

If your body developed high cholesterol through lifestyle, then change it, if it developed high cholesterol because you lacked statins....well you have one unusual body there....We don't develop a headache through lack of paracetamol and would you take a couple of those a day just in case and run the risk of stomach ulcers,probably not, but you might avoid things you know give you headaches.  That principle can be applied to cholesterol.  Before you decide if cholesterol is your friend or foe,watch Statin Nation, you can sometimes get to view it free on line somewhere or the website is http://www.statinnation.net/

Over in US yesterday, NBC ran a story on the harmful effects of Niacin, a vitamin that is prescribed there to lower LDL and raise HDL.  Declaring that Niacin is causing heart problems......Well there is a story that made no sense.....and of course the minute you look behind the headlines, and look at the study, it shows that they didn't look at Niacin as just Niacin, it was an extending release niacin, not the over the counter version we can all buy, and in the trial it was being used alongside a drug. NBC just forgot to mention that bit.

Given the drug companies can advertise their pills on national TV in the US, again, it's a follow the money job. 

It is absolutely right that when you really want to know something, go to the source.  Look at the study, not the reporting of the study with the bias attached. Look at the studies on Niacin and it's excellent safety record and than look at the side effects of statins.

You wonder what the point of news is when it is an inaccurate medley of what exactly? because it is hardly facts.

Not sure what you should do?   At the end of day, it is your body that the medicine goes into, your body that has to deal with it....Statins verses lifestyle......Once you see how statins work, you get an idea that they just might cause you the very problem they are being used to treat, so get informed before you make your decision.

Doctors know what drug companies tell them, that can be based on 'cherry picked' studies and if you have put a drug through costly trials,you are going to want to claw that money back, then we come to ethics over profit and that is often a debate that ethics might not do so well in.

Want to know the truth about Niacin, real Niacin, go to the source. Here is the best retort to the NBC news report.


Many doctors are calling for all studies on drugs to be published so they too can be better informed on what they tell patients.  It is with big pharma and their big bucks that the problem lays.

So who really is behind these two transatlantic stories.

I think currently 2 trials have to show that the drug works better than a placebo,even if another 8 show it doesn't.  That is kind of worth remembering for any drug you have to take.  Risk V Benefit, Ethics V Profit.....you decide.




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