"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast"
-Oscar Wilde		 Brilliant at Breakfast title banner "The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that watereth, shall be watered also himself."
-- Proverbs 11:25
"...you have a choice: be a fighting liberal or sit quietly. I know what I am, what are you?" -- Steve Gilliard, 1964 - 2007

"For straight up monster-stomping goodness, nothing makes smoke shoot out my ears like Brilliant@Breakfast" -- Tata

"...the best bleacher bum since Pete Axthelm" -- Randy K.

"I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum." -- "Rowdy" Roddy Piper (1954-2015), They Live
Wednesday, January 16, 2008

When a larger point is buried in a story
Posted by Jill | 7:06 AM
A few weeks ago, there was an article about a study that listed four things people can do to extend their lifespans. The study found that simply taking exercise, not drinking too much alcohol, eating enough fruit and vegetables and not smoking extended lifespan "regardless of how overweight or poor they were." Sort of tosses the whole BMI, overweight always = unhealthy conventional out on its ear, doesn't it? Imagine a world in which "living a healthy life" doesn't always require the kind of lifelong obsession with everything one puts into one's mouth that the diet/regain/diet/regain cycle that most overweight people live on does.

When you hit 50, the doctors start wanting to start you on statin drugs if your cholesterol is a tenth of a point above optimal, despite the fact that recent research seems to indicate that inflammation is a greater cause of heart disease than simple blood cholesterol levels, and despite the fact that one of the early statin drugs, lovastatin, was simply red yeast rice -- a dietary supplement that the FDA banned in 1999 after studies showed that it was effective in lowering cholesterol. Yes, folks, the FDA banned an inexpensive dietary supplement so that the pharmaceutical companies could make money selling it to you as a prescription drug. So far I've avoided the siren song of statins, admittedly by just not getting blood drawn for the past year, choosing instead to address saturated fat intake and banning trans fats from my diet.

Now the results of a clinical study show that a new cholesterol-lowering drug, Zetia, and its combination form, Vytorin, are not only ineffective in reducing the growth of fatty plaques, but even accelerated such growth.

But buried in this New York Times editorial on how long it took for the companies that produce the drug to release the study results is this (emphasis mine):

The findings also raise doubts about the current belief that lowering cholesterol is the key to cardiovascular health. The study showed that Vytorin reduced bad cholesterol significantly more than Zocor alone. The problem was that it failed to reduce the formation of plaque.


Say what? Uh...isn't it just as important that the study calls into question the entire notion of cholesterol being a significant risk factor for heart disease as that the drug doesn't work? Then why the hell are millions of Americans on statins, thinking that it's some kind of gospel truth that lowering cholesterol is some kind of magic bullet?

Labels: ,

3 comments
Bookmark and Share
3 Comments:
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Next time I see you, I'm bringing you a bouquet of garlic and crisp salad vegetables, with a little olive oil for dabbing behind the ear like so -

What? You'd prefer a boutonniere of spicy tuna and red spelt? That's so formal!
1/16/08, 8:24 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...
In this house hold, I almost can't help but pick up little tidbits about the science of "age management" (or, "living the best we can as long as we can"). I have been led to beleive that controlling inflamation of various sorts is absolutely a keystone of continued health. This is true whether we are talking about our joints, our circulatory system, our brains or any other body part you can name.
1/16/08, 10:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...
"Significantly more than Zocor alone" may still not have been much reduction. Statistically significant is like what, 2%?

If you could get reincarnated as a Swede, you could likely dispense with worrying about cholesterol. But then MS might be a worry----or you could choose to live as well as you could, and leave the fear stuff out of the equation as much as possible. While we fret over the latest fear, we don't live the lives we have.
1/16/08, 11:37 PM  
Post a Comment
<< Home