And Another Thing about Cholesterol

I have written before about  ads for statin drugs and how they are  going to give me high blood pressure and a heart attack.

The new one for  a drug called Crestor has got to be the most "through the looking glass," bizarro-world drug ad I've ever seen.

Why do we supposedly WANT to lower our cholesterol? Because high cholesterol has been correlated with an increase in heart disease and heart attacks. I might dispute that correlation=causation here, but set that aside for a moment.

Right there in the ad for Crestor it states that this drug does not protect against heart disease or heart attacks. All it does is lower your cholesterol. WHY WOULD ANYONE TAKE THIS DRUG? WHY WOULD ANY DOCTOR PRESCRIBE IT?

Has this whole frigging country gone stark raving insane? If everything they say about cholesterol and heart disease is true (which I don't believe, but again, just set that aside for now), then it seems fairly obvious that cholesterol levels are a "check engine" warning light for heart disease. A drug that reduces cholesterol levels without reducing heart disease or the incidence of heart attacks is simply cutting the wire to the "check engine" light and doing nothing to fix the engine.

This isn't a conspiracy theory, this isn't wild-eyed alternative medicine paranoia, this isn't even anything with an agenda. Forget my agenda. Forget your agenda. Just read the words. THIS DRUG WILL NOT PROTECT AGAINST HEART ATTACKS OR HEART DISEASE.

If Crestor was harmless and free, I guess this would most likely not matter. I'd just shake my head and say, oh well, let people have their pills, and maybe they'll feel better. But it is not harmless and it's not free.

I understand why Astra-Zeneca wants to manufacture it and sell it. What I don't get is why anyone else is going along with them on that. What am I missing?

Comments

[ol cranky]

I'm gonna get my arse in trouble for this, but my guess is the language a certain AZ attorney (and I'm making a specific guess who that was) mandated for the ad with the blessing of DDMAC. Having had direct access to the phase II and early phase III data for a certain statin; the data I saw showed it lowered LDLs and raised HDLs more than comparator statins (and was at least as safe and effective as other currently marketed statins).