No life saver: statins don’t stop heart disease

Heart disease stubbornly persists as the world’s major killer despite the billions spent on low-fat foods and cholesterol-lowering statin drugs. Two years on since the introduction of tougher thresholds, with almost everyone over the age of 50 invited to start statin therapy, mortality rates have barely shifted.

It’s not because the drugs don’t work: they are indeed lowering levels of the “bad”LDL (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol, the fats targeted by statins that, as the theory has it, deposit themselves around artery walls until blood flow to the heart is blocked, causing a heart attack.

But nonetheless, statins aren’t achieving the ultimate aim of a reduction in cardiovascular disease (CVD) and fatal heart attacks. That could be because the whole cholesterol and fats theory is wrong, as a new research