"When many cures are offered for a disease, it means the disease is not curable" -Anton Chekhov
''Once you tell people there's a cure for something, the more likely they are to pressure doctors to prescribe it.'' -Robert Ehrlich, drug advertising executive.
"Opinions are like sphincters, everyone has one." - Chris Rangel
Cholesterol-lowering drugs should be offered to all men over 50 and women over 60 as an effective “shortcut” to prevent heart disease, a government adviser has proposed.
Roger Boyle, the national director for heart disease and stroke, said that a “blanket approach” to give everyone above a certain age a daily dose of statins would save lives, NHS funding and doctors’ time.
Such a move would double the number of people taking the drug on prescription to about 6 million, which would bring the total cost of the drugs to more than £1 billion a year. Last year the cost of prescribing the drugs was about £550 million.
This commenter has is spot on:
That's right, dose everyone up until you find out that the medication is worse for you than the cholesterol was. Then give lawyers millions of pounds to administer £3.50 compensation. I think we've been here before. posted by Sydney on
7/28/2007 04:29:00 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
The other problem with putting any drug in the water is you lose control over dosage. That is the problem with fluoridated water - young children are getting fluorosis because they are getting too much fluoride for their bodyweight.
Young children would be very vulnerable, as forced low cholesterol levels would impede their development. There is a reason that breast milk is high in saturated fat and cholesterol - they are needed to develop a healthy nervous system, digestive tract, cell walls, and to be able to absorb vitamins A and D.
Cholesterol is also the precursor to all the steroid hormones, and one must wonder if rising fertility problems are due to lowered cholesterol levels from statin drug use. I haven't looked for a link, but I think it may be possible.
Statins in the water supply also removes individual choice and informed consent. I certainly would not want to consume statins, and I don't want to add to the huge garbage problem caused by drinking bottled water. So where does that leave me - between a rock and a hard place. Adding statins to the water supply is simply a terrible idea all around.
The "statins in the water" was hyperbole. But the belief that everyone over a certain age should take the things regardless of their health status or cholesterol levels comes pretty close to putting them in the water.
Pretty funny that I completely missed the point - LOL! I was so horrified by the prospect and fully believed that putting statins in the water was something that governments may decide to do that - well, phew! Thank goodness that's not happening, is all I can say!
When one really studies the link between cardiovascular disease and high cholesterol, it is surprisingly weak considering the religious fervor with which statins are prescribed. This entertaining article by Dr. Malcolm Kendrick pretty much blows the high cholesterol=heart disease theory out of the water, and he certainly isn't the only one that disagrees with the hypothesis! So if the theory is wrong, statins just create unnecessary problems in my opinion ...
The Brits also came up with the idea that they should tax high fat food. Figuring that would not be enough they decided to tax substitutes. The final list was over 3000 products.
Remember in NYC they have mandatory filings for blood sugar readings of diabetics. The whole trans-fat idea started there because politicians know that they're the cause of the obesity epidemic in this country. They wanted to tax autos out of existence in the city core. There is always a group that know what is best for us and are willing to spend any amount of our money to prove they are right.
Mandatory age triggered medication is here now. One doctor went so far as to state that I would be required to take a statin at 55 or loose my insurance, because she was not going to pay for my preventable heart attract at 80.
All the while pharma smiles on the way to the bank.
