Study finds astronomical numbers of seniors now in the statin crosshairs

Is this the latest Obamacare trap to snare seniors?

How did collecting Social Security suddenly become a risk factor for heart disease? And in many cases, the only risk!

I know it sounds crazy, but if you look at the numbers, that’s exactly what’s happening.

A doctor from the Minneapolis Heart Institute Foundation recently published a study documenting how many of us over 65 have now been pushed into the statin trap.

But instead of bringing to light this dangerous new development, his study became another classic example of “Press Release Medicine.”

One that gave us headlines that read: “Elderly should take cholesterol-lowering statins: US study,” or, “Statins may lower risk of heart disease for most seniors: Study.”

Of course, if anyone had bothered to read the doctor’s study, they would have seen that wasn’t what it was saying at all.

But it was certainly the message Big Pharma wanted us to hear.

If you were scanning the news recently and saw those headlines saying that just about every person over 65 should now “take stains” to protect their health, you may have gotten the wrong idea.

It would have been easy to think that this was about some new research — one showing a big benefit from statin drugs if you’re over a certain age. But that’s wasn’t the case.

Not at all.

Those headlines were referring to research that looked at how many more of us will be “eligible” for popping statins under guidelines released last year by the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association.

When I first heard about this new plan, I knew that the numbers would be astronomical. But research cardiologist Dr. Michael Miedema did the math.

And what he reported in his study is frightening.

Now, 97 percent of women 66 and over will likely be getting that “statin talk” from their doctor. And that’s regardless of what their cholesterol level is — even if it’s “perfect.”

And for men it gets even worse.

A nice round figure of 100 percent of guys over 66 “need” to be on the drug according to the numbers crunched by Dr. Miedema.

That’s every single man over 66 regardless of his health or cholesterol numbers!

But here are some things you didn’t read in those “breaking” news stories about the doctor’s study…

How the new “guidelines are a significant change” from the prior ones that “relied heavily” on what your cholesterol level is before a doctor hands out an Rx for one of these drugs.

Or how getting a statin will now depend on “age alone,” and that’s even if you have “normal cholesterol levels and no other cardiovascular risk factors.”

And…about what can happen to older people who take these drugs.

Your age can make the side effects of statins — such as stomach distress, muscle breakdown, memory problems, diabetes, liver damage…and cancer — even more likely.

Dr. Miedema said that “we clearly need more research” to figure out “who should and should not take a statin.”

But the answer to that question is pretty easy.

It’s that no one of any age — and especially those over 65 — should be taking these drugs.

Even the AHA previously said that statin use “should be employed more cautiously in older persons.”

And experts from Harvard have been saying that these new guidelines have “serious flaws.” That group was sounding the alarm bells over a year before this deadly new plan came out.

But those warning are now yesterday’s news.

If the media was going to give us headlines that really told the story, it would go more like this: “Seniors more likely to be harmed by statin drugs, but the AHA says they should take them anyway.”

Sources:
“Statins may lower risk of heart disease for most seniors: study” Aaron Mamiit, November 26, 2014, Tech Times, techtimes.com