SLOPPY SCIENCE? UK MP Calls for Investigation of Statins

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You know that I have long been skeptical of statins. For over a decade I have been sharing troubling information about statins with you here on Richardcyoung.com. Here’s just a sample of what you have learned.

• A Doubling of Statin Drug Takers?
• Statin Drugs: Part 1
• Statin Drugs: Part 2
• Harvard Biostatistician Attacks New Statin Drug Guidelines
• Are Statin Drugs Like Crestor and Lipitor for You?
• Statin Drugs/NNT Alert
• New Research Suggests Statins are Over-Prescribed
• Study: Statins Not Useful in Healthy Elderly to Prevent Heart Disease
• Your Odds with Statins: 500 to 1?
• Do Your Own Research on Statins
• Lipitor—Junk Science Math

Now, after years of blockades by pharmaceutical companies and the health establishment, some politicians are calling for an investigation of statin drugs. Dr, Joseph Mercola reports on his blog that British MP Sir Norman Lamp has called for an investigation of the drugs. Mercola writes:

British MP Calls for Parliamentary Inquiry Into Statins

The good news is, more and more scientists are now starting to see this truth. A March 9, 2019, article⁶ in European Scientist reported:

“Earlier this week, the Chair of the British Parliament Science and Technology Committee, Sir Norman Lamb MP made calls for a full investigation into cholesterol lowering statin drugs.

It was instigated after a letter was written to him signed by a number of eminent international doctors including the editor of the BMJ, the Past President of the Royal College of Physicians and the Director of the Centre of Evidence Based Medicine in Brazil … calling for a full parliamentary inquiry into the controversial medication.”

In the article, the lead author of the letter, cardiologist Aseem Malhotra, discusses the dangers of statins, and how the flawed cholesterol hypothesis and the corresponding low-fat myth are pushing patients’ health in the wrong direction. He writes, in part:⁷

“It is not just financial interests that bias research findings but also intellectual hubris in medicine too. It was the father of the evidence based medicine movement the late Professor David Sackett who said ‘Fifty percent of what you learn in medical school will turn out to be either outdated or dead wrong within five years of your graduation, the trouble is no one can tell you which half so you have to learn to learn on your own.’

In the past 30 years, there have now been 44 randomized controlled trials that reveal no cardiovascular mortality benefit from diet or various drug trials from lowering cholesterol.

Most conspicuous was the recent ACCELERATE trial with over 12,000 patients at high risk of heart disease that revealed no reductions in heart attack, stroke or death despite a 37% reduction in LDL-cholesterol.

But how many doctors actually keep up with the latest evidence? Many will defend the cholesterol lowering dogma with their more inquisitive patients by saying they’re just following guidelines, unaware that the guidelines themselves are based upon biased research often written by scientists with strong personal or institutional financial ties to the industry.”

Scientific Review Declares Statin Claims Are Overblown

Another newsworthy review⁸ that ties into Malhotra’s arguments against statins was published in the Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology in September 2018. It identified significant flaws in three recent studies “published by statin advocates” attempting “to validate the current dogma.”

The paper presents substantial evidence that total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels are not an indication of heart disease risk, and that statin treatment is of “doubtful benefit” as a form of primary prevention for this reason. The paper also details the tactics used in statin studies to exaggerate the benefits. Among them:

•Excluding unsuccessful trials where statins either had no or negative impact on CVD risk or mortality

•Using “evidence” that isn’t a true exposure-response

•Cherry-picking data that supports the conclusion of benefit

•Ignoring the most important outcome — an increase in life expectancy

•Using a statistical tool called relative risk reduction to amplify trivial effects — This was also addressed more directly in a 2015 report^9,10 titled “How Statistical Deception Created the Appearance That Statins Are Safe and Effective in Primary and Secondary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease.”

Here, the authors point out that if you look at absolute risk, statin drugs benefit just “1% of the treated participants.”¹¹ This means that out of 100 people treated with the drugs for five years, one person will have one less heart attack.

According to the authors of the 2018 review:¹²

“For some years, many researchers have questioned the results from statin trials because they have been denied access to the primary data. In 2004–2005, health authorities in Europe and the United States introduced New Clinical Trial Regulations, which specified that all trial data had to be made public. Since 2005, claims of benefit from statin trials have virtually disappeared.”