It’s time to give credit where credit is due.
Your body is inhabited by an innate intelligence. It knows how to fix itself – and it wants to fix itself. But it needs the right raw materials.
And those seldom come from a chemical capsule. The latest case in point is statin drugs, reportedly taken by more than 30 million Americans.
Newsletter #610
Lee Euler, Editor
Lee Euler, Editor
If you test high for cholesterol, your doctor will probably insist you take a statin drug. Most likely, your mother, father, brother, sister, cousin, and best friend are all on them. Do you have the guts to go against the grain?
I hope so, because these trendy drugs are associated with cancer and memory loss. What’s more, there is NO proof they reduce your risk of heart attack. Here’s what you need to know. . .
There’s a rapidly growing body of research showing that, despite drug industry claims that statin drugs protect against cancer, they actually promote cancer.
Here are just a few findings:
- Linked to increased risk of prostate cancer, in a study of nearly 2,000 men. And the higher the statin dose, the higher the risk.1
- Higher cumulative daily doses of statins were linked to higher kidney cancer risk in patients over age 50.2
- More cancer incidence and cancer deaths in the statins group in a 2009 study.3
- Statin use is linked with thyroid cancer in women.4
- Women using statins long-term (10+ years) had DOUBLE the risk of breast cancer… a 1.83-fold increased risk of invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) and a 1.97-fold increase in invasive lobular carcinoma (ILC) versus those who never used statins.5
Of course, correlation doesn’t prove causation. Given that these women were compliant with use of statins, they were probably also compliant with breast screening guidelines.
And breast screenings are linked to the over-diagnosis and over-treatment of 1.3 million American women over the past 30 years, so the screenings could result in more cancer diagnoses.
That’s giving statins every benefit of the doubt. On the other hand, the result could mean that statins pose a far worse problem… that statins are in some way, shape or form, carcinogenic.
At a bare minimum, these studies raise serious questions about the recent push to claim statin drugs are chemo-preventive or chemotherapeutic. (By the way, “chemo-preventive” describes any drug or chemical agent, even a food supplement, that prevents cancer.)
Authors of four studies have casually dismissed the possibility that statin drugs may cause cancer. Among other things, they claim the evidence is “insignificant,” or has “no known potential biological basis.” I wouldn’t bet on it.
Statins are also linked to an increase in diabetes, and we know there’s a connection between high blood sugar and cancer.
And the news gets even worse.
Toxic to your brain, muscles and more
Statins are linked to more than 300 adverse effects in the published scientific literature, so far…
They’re toxic to your brain, muscles, nerves, and liver. They cause diabetes, cancer, and birth defects, and disrupt your hormones.
Statins do serious damage to your most cholesterol-dependent organs – like your brain.
Turns out your brain is the most cholesterol-rich organ in your body, boasting one-fourth of all your cholesterol. Seventy percent of that – nearly three-fourths of the cholesterol in your brain — is in the essential myelin sheath that protects your nerve cells.
No wonder cholesterol plays such a pivotal role in brain health.
Low cholesterol has been named a biological marker of major depression and suicidal behavior, whereas high cholesterol is protective. One study showed that thoughts of suicide are more than 2½ times greater in adults taking statins.
Ditto for dementia. If you’ve ever worried about losing your mind to Alzheimer’s – or even if you want to avoid having “senior moments” – then skip the statins. Memory loss, including full-blown dementia, is one of the most common side effects of taking statin drugs.
Statins also cause severe irritability, homicidal tendencies, road rage, threatening behavior, violence, paranoia, antisocial behavior, plus bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
You have to damage your heart in order to save it?
One of the most well-known statin side effects is muscle breakdown and pain, as in peripheral neuropathy – the pain in fingers, toes, arms and legs associated with advanced diabetes. The rate of occurrence is as high as 40 percent in just the first few months of statin use.
One of the worst outcomes of muscle toxicity is – irony of ironies – that statins actually damage your heart – your hardest working muscle. The one statins supposedly protect.
Big Pharma has gone to the ends of the world to promote statins as the ultimate wonder drug.
Yet with statins your heart gets weaker instead of stronger.
Statins deplete heart-protective coenzyme Q10, as well as cardio-protective minerals. Statins also decimate omega-3 fatty acids. That’s why omega-3s are protective for those who don’t use statins, but are of no benefit to statin users.
Just to sum up all this: millions of statin users are risking their hearts and their very lives on a bad bet.
Heart disease is not caused by lack of a drug.
Nor is it caused by high cholesterol.
Fight the real culprit behind heart disease
Your arteries don’t suddenly become clogged because you eat too many eggs or even too much richly-marbled beef and pork. This myth is a carryover from a poorly run study that led everyone to shun fatty foods a few decades ago. These days, the theory that natural fat causes heart disease or obesity is dead and buried.
The big mistake is lumping all fats into one evil category.
First order of business: Ditch all cheap vegetable oils.
After all the publicity about this subject, I hope most people are savvy enough to know that hydrogenated fats – trans fats — are bad. But here’s the proverbial elephant in the room…
Hydrogenated oils are the #1 cause of heart disease and a major contributor to neurological disorders. Their poison accelerates plaque buildup like crazy.
They’re artificial and never appear in nature. They’re made solely for the convenience and profit of food manufacturers. They spoil less readily than do natural fats and therefore give foods a longer shelf life.
Hydrogenated oils are found abundantly in nearly every baked, fried, and packaged product in your grocery store (and favorite restaurant). The aisles containing vegetable and wheat crackers, cookies and chips are so tainted with this heart poison they should carry a warning label.
Look for the words “hydrogenated” or “partially hydrogenated,” and if you see either, put the item back. Let food makers know they can no longer sell you chemicals in a pretty box and call it food.
Enjoy delicious foods that protect you from heart disease
Now that you know what to avoid, it’s time to enjoy foods that’ll actually help sweep your arteries clean. And they won’t cause cancer either.
You need healthy natural fats like omega-3 fatty acids, fish, nuts, seeds, butter, olive and coconut oil, and avocados.
In addition, enjoy this lip-smacking food that gives statins a $29 billion run for their money…
Chocolate. Just half an ounce a week lowers your blood pressure and reduces your risk of dying from any cause by a stunning 50%. More delicious than a statin any day. Use in moderation, and cut your risk of heart disease in half.
Make sure you eat dark chocolate. Health food stores now feature chocolate bars whose labels tell you the percentage that’s dark. Personally, I choose 100% dark chocolate – no sugar or milk at all. Takes some getting used to, but now I like it.
And here’s a tip you learned as a child…
Pass the apples… Pass on the statins
An apple a day. Oxford researchers found that one apple per day was as effective as statins – without the awful side effects.6 The worst side effect from apples was the trauma caused by a bruised apple – or finding half a worm inside.
Another study found that an apple a day for just four weeks lowered LDL cholesterol by 40%.7 Editorial comment: That’s incredible.
Pomegranate. A study showed that drinking pomegranate juice daily reversed carotid artery stenosis (a leading cause of stroke) by up to 29% within one year.8 Meanwhile, blockages in the control group that didn’t consume pomegranate got nine percent worse. Pomegranate has been shown to have a long list of heart benefits.
Other foods. Eat generous amounts of these foods if you want to have a healthy heart: garlic, organic spinach, organic berries, turmeric, chia seeds, tomatoes, leafy greens, olive oil, and organic green tea.
If you follow all or even a few of these tips, chances are, you’ll never hear your doctor say you need statin drugs. Just say no, and spare yourself cancer, brain dysfunction, neuropathy, diabetes, and so much more.
