Calling your bluff
Since the news broke last month, the new cholesterol screening and statin drug guidelines for children have been a hot topic of conversation around the office. After I sent you the urgent email warning you of these guidelines (7/7/08 eTip, subject line "Sacrificial lambs"), Dr. Wright and I talked some more about this new development. As he put it, this is "yet another big-profit step for Big Pharma, and another step towards ill-health for our children." Dr. Wright also told me about some information he'd read by former NASA astronaut and U.S. Air Force surgeon Duane Graveline, M.D., regarding a potentially life- threatening effect of long-term use of cholesterol-lowering statin medications. In his book Lipitor, Thief of Memory, Dr. Graveline discusses the dramatic cognitive impairment that can occur as the result of statin use. This sort of mental decline can lead to dementia and Alzheimer's disease, which is terrible enough for everyone involved when it occurs in people in their 80s and 90s. So imagine how devastating it would be to see these effects in patients in their 20s and 30s who had been on statins since childhood. Sure, these risks might be hypothetical right now, since statins haven't yet been widely prescribed to children. But why wait around to see whether or not they become a reality? Think of it like using your child's life as the ante in some sick and twisted bet. The loss you'll suffer if your bluff gets called makes the potential payoff a lot less appealing, doesn't it? If you're still not convinced, Dr. Graveline has a lot more information to share on the hazards associated with statin drugs -- things I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy, let alone an innocent child. To check out Dr. Graveline's research, visit his website, www.spacedoc.net. |
