Cholesterol lowering drug 'increases risk of cancer by 50 per cent'
Article in the Telegraph
Extract 1:
"Researchers found there were 105 cases of cancer in people taking Inegy compared to 70 in those on a dummy drug over a four year period.
The study also suggested that Inegy, which combines a statin called simvastatin and another drug called ezetimibe, has little effect in reducing the risk of heart attacks and strokes.
Prof Heinz Drexel, of the University of Innsbruck in Austria and spokesman for the European Society of Cardiology, said: "I am not sure that the efficacy is proven and I am not sure that the safety is proven. I wouldn't take the drug myself.
"In patients with an urgent need to reduce cholesterol I would give them the drug but that is they are the exception and that is not consistent with how it is being used currently. "It is being more widely used than I think it should be. We can use something else in patients whose cholesterol is not sky high."
In the last two years 300,000 prescriptions for Inegy were dispensed in England and Wales and between four and five million people are thought to be taking standard statins."
Note well that Prof Heinz Drexel would not take Inegy himself! It's rare for a doctor to speak as forthrightly as that.
Extract 2:
"There was also a higher proportion of deaths from cancer with 39 deaths in the Inegy group and 23 deaths in those on the placebo.
The cancers in both groups were across all major areas of the body including the skin and lungs, according to the findings, which were also published in the New England Journal of Medicine."
The best and the completely safe way to reduce the risk of most cancers is to avoid prescription drugs unless they are absolutely necessary and rigorously avoid salt and salty food and make sure you eat plenty of fruit and unsalted vegetables.
Lose weight, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
And see Sodium in foods and
Associated health conditions