3rd February 2019
A number of people have asked for my views on the Lancet Paper ‘Efficacy and safety of statin therapy in older people: a meta-analysis of individual participant data from 28 randomized controlled trials.’
It was reported in various major newspapers.
The Times reported the study thus: “Everyone over the age of 75 should be considered for cholesterol-lowering statins, experts have urged, after an analysis found up to 8,000 lives a year could be saved.”1
The Telegraph had this to say. “Researchers said up to 8,000 deaths a year could be prevented if GPs simply prescribed drugs costing pennies a day.”
This comes hot on the heels of a concerted effort to silence statin critics around the world by a coalition of ‘experts. I suspect the coordinated timing is more than a coincidence.
‘The editors of more than two dozen cardiology-related scientific journals around the world published an editorial Monday to “sound the alarm that human lives are at stake” because of medical misinformation.
These physicians describe regularly encountering patients hesitant to take potentially lifesaving medications or adhere to other prescribed treatments because of something they read online. Or heard from friends. Or saw on television.
“There is a flood of bad information on the internet and social media that is hurting human beings,” said Dr. Joseph Hill, the architect of the essay and editor-in-chief of the American Heart Association journal Circulation. “It’s not just an annoyance, this actually puts people in harm’s way.”
The primary example illustrated in the editorial is the use of statins, a cholesterol-lowering medicine that can reduce heart attack and stroke risk in certain people. But doctors say too many of their patients shun taking statins because of bad information they picked up – often from politicians, celebrities and others who lack medical expertise.’2
Essentially, they feel that certain issues, such as prescribing statins, are so vitally important that critics should be silenced. Perhaps all these editors should try reading this:
‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.’
Yes, the US founding fathers knew the first thing tyrannies always wish to do is remove freedom of speech. From that, all else follows. If they don’t get that message, they should all be forced to read 1984 by George Orwell.
“Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.”
Getting back to the Lancet paper. What do I think of it? The first thing to note is ‘who done it.’ Well, of course, it was the Cholesterol Treatment Triallists Collaboration (CTT) from Oxford. Run by Professor Sir Rory Collins and Professor Colin Baigent. They do almost all these meta-analyses on statins, because they hold all the data. So, no-one else can really do them.
The CTT is in this hallowed position because they made a pact with the dev… sorry … they made a pact with the pharmaceutical industry to take hold of all the data on statins from all the pharmaceutical companies that manufacture statins and collate the data.
The CTT are very closely associated with the Oxford Clinical Trials Service Unit (CTSU) which is run by, and has employed, most of those in the CTT. Collins and Baigent etc. The CTSU is a clinical trials unit which, last time I looked, had obtained nearly £300 million in funding from the pharmaceutical industry for running clinical trials on various cholesterol lowering medications.
A fact that needs to be emphasised is that the CTT will not let anyone else see the data they hold. Including all the data on adverse events [side-effects] and serious adverse events. It is kept completely secret. I have the e-mail exchange between an Australian journalist and Professor Colin Baigent where the journalist attempts to find out if it is true that the CTT will not let anyone else see the safety data.
It starts quite well and the tone is amiable. Eventually Professor Colin Baigent clams up and refuses to answer any further questions. I have promised said journalist to keep this exchange under wraps, but almost every day I am tempted to publish it. It is toe-squirming.
Anyway, my point here is that the CTT is a horribly conflicted organisation, and has been paid, directly, or indirectly, a great deal of money by the pharmaceutical industry. Here are the conflicts of interest of those involved in writing the Lancet paper:
Conflicts of interest of statement from the Lancet paper: Commercial organisations in bold.
RO’C, EB, IF, CW, and JS have nothing to disclose. JF reports personal fees from Amgen, Bayer, Pfizer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Sanofi, and AstraZeneca, outside the submitted work; and non-financial support from Amgen, Bayer, and Pfizer, outside the submitted work. BM reports grants from the Medical Research Council, British Heart Foundation, and the National Institute for Health Research Oxford Biomedical Research Centre during the conduct of the study, and grants from Merck outside the submitted work. CR report grants from the Medical Research Council and British Heart Foundation during the conduct of the study; and grants from Merck, outside the submitted work. JE reports grants from the Medical Research Council and the British Heart Foundation during the conduct of the study, and a grant from Boehringer Ingelheim outside the submitted work. LB reports grants from the Medical Research Council and the British Heart Foundation during the conduct of the study. MK is an employee of a company that has received study grants and consulting fees from manufacturers of PCSK9 inhibitors and treatments for lipid disorders, outside the submitted work. AT reports personal fees from Amgen and Sanofi, outside the submitted work. PR reports a research grant from AstraZeneca during the conduct of the study; and research grants from Novartis, Pfizer, and Kowa, outside the submitted work. CP reports a grant from Merck, outside the submitted work; and personal fees from Merck, Pfizer, Sanofi, Amgen, and Daiichi-Sankyo, outside the submitted work. EL reports grants from AstraZeneca, Bayer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Amgen, and Merck, outside the submitted work; and personal fees from Bayer, Amgen, Novartis, and Sanofi, outside the submitted work. WK reports grants and non-financial support from Roche, Beckmann, Singulex, and Abbott, outside the submitted work; and personal fees from AstraZeneca, Novartis, Pfizer, The Medicines Company, GlaxoSmithKline, Dalcor, Sanofi, Berlin-Chemie, Kowa, and Amgen, outside the submitted work. AG reports personal fees from Aegerion Pharmaceuticals, Arisaph Pharmaceuticals, DuPont, Esperion Therapeutics, Kowa, Merck, Roche, Vatera Capital, ISIS Pharmaceuticals, Weill Cornell Medicine, and Amgen, outside the submitted work. SY reports a grant from AstraZeneca, outside the submitted work. RC reports support from the Nuffield Department of Population Health, during the conduct of the study; grants from the British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK, Medical Research Council, Merck, National Institute for Health Research, and the Wellcome Trust, outside the submitted work; personal fees from the British Heart Foundation and UK Biobank, outside the submitted work; other support from Pfizer to the Nuffield Department of Population Health (prize for independent research); and a patent for a statin-related myopathy genetic test licensed to University of Oxford from Boston Heart Diagnostics (RC has waived any personal reward). CB reports grants from the Medical Research Council and British Heart Foundation, during the conduct of the study; and grants from Pfizer, Merck, Novartis, and Boehringer Ingelheim, outside the submitted work. AK reports grants from Abbott and Mylan, outside the submitted work; and personal fees from Abbott, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Mylan, and Pfizer, outside the submitted work. LB reports grants from UK Medical Research Council and the British Heart Foundation during the conduct of the study.
As to the study itself. I wrote this as a ‘rapid response’ to an article Colin Baigent wrote in the BMJ about the study. It may be published, it may not be.
‘I would like to ask Colin Baigent one question on this study – at this time. He claims that the Lancet study was a meta-analysis of twenty-eight RCTs. The study was called. ‘Efficacy and safety of statin therapy in older people: a meta-analysis of individual participant data from 28 randomised controlled trials.’
However, in the Appendix to the Lancet paper it is made clear that five of the studies are a comparison of high dose vs. low dose statins. PROVE-IT, A to Z, TNT, IDEAL and SEARCH. They cannot be used to test the hypothesis that statins are beneficial in the over 75s vs. placebo, as they were not done to answer this question.
Also, in nine of the RCTs used in the meta-analysis there were 0% participants over the age of 75 at the start of the study. These were 4S, WOSCOPS, CARE, Post CABG, AFCAPS/TexCaps, ALERT, LIPID, ASPEN and MEGA.
Which means that five of the studies could not address the question of statins vs placebo in the over 75s, and nine of the studies had no participants over the age of 75, which leaves fourteen studies that would be relevant to the issue of prescribing statins in the over 75s.
My question is, why did you call this study ‘Efficacy and safety of statin therapy in older people: a meta-analysis of individual participant data from 28 randomised controlled trials.‘
Yes, they claimed to have done a meta-analysis of twenty-eight studies, yet they could only use data from fourteen to make their claims. The largest of which was the Heart Protection Study (HPS), carried out by, guess who, Rory Collins from the CTSU and CTT.
As for the actual data, it is the usual obfuscation, skirting as close to the direct lie as possible without crossing that line. I am just going to look at one issue. The main claim was that “statin therapy or a more intensive statin regimen produced a 21% (RR 0·79, 95% CI 0·77–0·81) proportional reduction in major vascular events per 1·0 mmol/L reduction in LDL cholesterol.”
A 21% reduction in major vascular events. That sounds terribly impressive. However, if you have read my book Doctoring Data you will know that what is most important here is not what is said, it is what is not said.
Do you see any mention of overall mortality here? No, you don’t. Which means that it did not change. Also, you may note this wording ‘reduction in major vascular events.’ What is a major vascular event? Well, it is mainly a non-fatal heart attack or a non-fatal stroke. There are other CV events, but they are much less common.
Note again, no mention of fatal CV events. If there had been a reduction here, it would have been trumpeted from the rooftops. Which means that we have no reduction in mortality and no reduction in fatal CV events. Of course, it is worth preventing non-fatal heart attacks and strokes, as these can be extremely damaging and harmful things.
However, there is something worth mentioning here that I have not really covered before. There are heart attacks and heart attacks, and strokes and strokes. A heart attack (MI) can be a crushing near-death event, leaving the heart severely weakened and liable to trigger into a fatal heart arrythmia at any time. The patient can be left a cardiac cripple.
Alternatively, a heart attack can be diagnosed by a marginal rise in cardiac enzymes with no symptoms at all, and no residual problems. Yet, both of these events, so completely different in their impact, will be listed as a non-fatal heart attack, with precisely the same weighting.
Equally, a stroke can leave the person virtually paralysed down one side, incontinent, unable to speak, eat, or move. Or, it can be a half hour strange sensation with slight facial weakness that fully resolves. Again, both these events will be listed with precisely the same weighting.
That is a problem in itself, in that these trials list events of completely different severity as being equivalent. It also leads into another problem, who is going to make the diagnosis of a mild heart attack or stroke – and on what grounds?
It will most likely be a doctor, and that doctor will have prior knowledge of whether or not the patient was on a statin – or placebo. Yes, I know, clinical trials are supposed to be double-blinded, which means that neither the participant, nor the investigator, should know who is taking the drug, or the placebo.
However, in reality, they both know full well.
I was at a meeting a while back where one of the investigators for the PCKS-9 drug Repatha was talking about the study. At one point he mentioned that a trial participant had told him that he knew he was not taking the cholesterol lowering agent. When questioned how he knew this, the participant said – because my cholesterol level is the same as it always was.
He still wanted to continue on the trial, because he thought we was doing a ‘good’ thing and helping to move medicine forward – and suchlike. I feel it may be considered churlish to point out that the only thing he was helping to move forward was the profit margins for Amgen.
The reality is that when you have a medication that has a significant effect, e.g. lowering cholesterol by 40%, this is a very difficult to thing to hide from the patient, or the doctor. They can see the figures on a computer screen in front of them. And when you are on a clinical trial, and you enter hospital, the doctors have to be told you are in a clinical trial, and what it is.
So, these double blinded studies on statins are not effectively, or even remotely, double-blinded. Which means that bias in clinical decision making is now an option. Was it a heart attack, or not? Well, they are on a statin – so probably not. Or, they are taking a placebo, so it probably is. Bias, the very thing you are trying to remove has crept straight back in the side door.
Another issue with an event is that there are many different sorts of clinical event. Death would be one – obviously. Breaking your leg another. Kidney failure would also count as one, as would a severe rash, or emergency admission to a hospital for almost any reason.
So, when a study states, as this one does ‘reduction in major vascular events.’ My mind, as it is now trained to do, thinks to itself: “ What about other events, what happened to them? Were they also reduced, did they say the same, or did they go up?”
Because if you reduce major vascular events, but other serious events go up, then you have achieved exactly and precisely nothing. This is a variation on pushing people off cliffs to stop them dying of heart attacks.
Results: ‘Pushing one hundred people prevented all trial participants from suffering a fatal heart attack. We therefore recommend pushing everyone off a cliff to reduce the incidence of heart attacks in the general population.’ A.N. Idiot et al.
Statins reduce major vascular events. [A major non-fatal vascular event could also be called as Serious Adverse Event (SAE)]. But do they reduce all serious adverse events (SEAs). If not, you are simply replacing a major vascular event with something equally nasty.
Which leads on to the next question, do we know from the statin trials if statins do reduce SAEs in total? The answer is that we do not know this, for sure, because the CTT has these data, and refuses to let anyone else see them. However, some data has not been censored by big brother. The Cochrane collaboration (before they started the sad slide to bias and corruption) looked at this issue – way back in 2003.
They got as much data as they could from the five major primary prevention statin trials at the time. Here was their conclusion on Serious Adverse Events:
‘In the two trials where serious adverse events are reported, the 1.8% absolute reduction in myocardial infarction and stroke should be reflected by a similar absolute reduction in total serious adverse events; myocardial infarction and stroke are, by definition, serious adverse events. However, this is not the case; serious adverse events are similar in the statin group, 44.2%, and the control group, 43.9%.
This is consistent with the possibility that unrecognized serious adverse events are increased by statin therapy and that the magnitude of the increase is similar to the magnitude of the reduction in cardiovascular serious adverse events in these populations. This hypothesis needs to be tested by analysis of total serious adverse event data in both past and future statin trials. Serious adverse event data is available to trial authors, drug companies and drug regulators. The other measure of overall impact, total mortality, is available in all five trials and is not reduced by statin therapy.’ 3
What does this mean in reality? Well, gathering it all together. Statins (in the over 75s) do not reduce mortality. They do not prevent fatal Mis and strokes. Whilst they reduce serious cardiac events, previously published results demonstrate they do not reduce total serious adverse events.
Which means that they are, wait for it, absolutely and completely useless.
Two plus two does equal four. Always bear that fact in mind.
1: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(18)31942-1/fulltext
2: https://www.heart.org/en/news/2019/01/28/medical-experts-sound-the-alarm-on-medical-misinformation
3: https://www.ti.ubc.ca/pages/letter48.htm
Dr. Malcolm Kendrick 
Thank you
Frightening
Statins supposedly lower cholesterol. Not a good thing to lower since it is an essential nutrient. Without it the liver cannot dispose of the fructose it processes. Fructose causes more glycation damage than glucose. My, it gets complicated. Try at about 10mins in https://youtu.be/_qq9KkLKLAE
Frightening – how is this for a denouement of the whole scene. We begin with the presentation from Dr Malhotra :-
Stents and Statins – do they work ? – A top Cardiologist’s view
Well presented though a bit of a nuisance that Dr Malhotra had such a hurried time frame, but, the meat of the matter is presented.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgxwCgVTZrrqCTsxPcMMssfpVdMQf?projector=1
Major pharmaceutical companies have been found guilty of fraud, 2007 to 2014, 14 million dollars worth of fines were paid by pharma for findings of fraud ! This involved the top ten pharmaceutical companies. The problem is, there is no incentive for them to stop doing this… “If you commit crime and crime pays, you commit more crime.” And that is what they (Pharma) are doing.
From the former Editor of The New England Journal of Medicine : “It is no longer possible to trust or to rely on the judgement of trusted physicians or authorities in medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in reaching this conclusion which I do slowly and reluctantly following two decades as Editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Another editor Richard Walton wrote an editorial in 2016, saying that : “possibly half of the published literature may simply be untrue.”
Richard Smith, former editor of the BMJ said that : “There is something rotten in the state of British medicine and has been for a long time…!”
Then move on to this denouement :-
Duke Settles Doctored Data Lawsuit for $112.5 Million – March 2019
Suggestion – check this one out…and, do read the comments :-
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/910871#vp_2
Plus this lot –
Recommendations
‘Outsider’ Oncologist Whistleblowers Share in $100M Reward
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/905367
Huge Cancer Research Fraud, But Only One Doc Blamed
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/854595
Feds (Finally) Say that Researcher Faked Data
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/854157
Very interesting and thought provoking as always. There is also the issue as to whether prolonging the lives of the over 75s by allegedly reducing strokes and MIs is a good thing if those prolonged lives are spent unhappily with dementia and crippling muscle-skeletal problems in care homes.
Yes some people do old age better than others. I would seriously prefer a fatal heart attack soon to many of the alternatives.
Thank you so much for putting the time and effort into this. It’s constant fire-fighting at the moment with scary headlines. Sadly many people are being blown with the wind — back to statins, other meds and high-carb processed foods.
Thank you kind Sir. I saw the newspaper report, saw a name I recognised, and thought “Ah, more lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
Other Half who turns 76 tomorrow says if he sees a doctor who tries to prescribe (Unlikely, he avoids them) he will respectfully suggest that said doctor deals with the pills by inserting them up his(doctor’s) fundament, without removing them fom the bubble pack.
Jean Humphreys: I love it when a writer sends me to the dictionary!
whose edges, one hopes, are sharp
Hahaha I just remembered long ago someone who was prescribed suppositories. After the first couple he finally read the bit about removing then from the silver paper first.
Thank you, I’ve been waiting for your reply to this report. How many of those meta analyses are still to come?
Thanks Malcolm. Once again simple presentation of the facts & clear logic.
It is such a pity that the Lancet & the BBC has become mouthpeices for propaganda
I am afraid it is all a manifestation of how money is conquering the world. It has swept through civilisation as the Mongols swept through Eurasia – and it has caused about as much harm.
Time was when people had values: kindness, charity (also known as love), honour, duty, self-respect, fairness.
Increasingly those are all being relegated to the dustbin of outmoded beliefs, and replaced by the belief that it is everyone’s duty to get as much money as possible by any means – no holds barred. Even respect for the law is inoperative: the real reason laws are obeyed (if and when they are obeyed) is that going to prison would slow down or prevent the earning of more money.
Ah, yes, it’s a sweet — and profitable — racket that Sir Rory et al have. Sad that the phenomenon of the med profession whoring for the corporations seems as widespread in the UK as it is in the US.
If you thought it bad back in 2019, what are you thinking today, in 2022?
Nail by nail its time we got this right
Dr K, you realize that the cat is out of the bag now?…please,please let us see that email exchange (!!!!) You are known as somebody with both a heart AND a backbone, something that draws admiration from your subscribers simply because nobody says ‘boo to a goose’ in 2019…it would invite ire for sure, but how telling it would be.And it would make you a Mordechai Vannunu no 2 (wink wink)…
Hmm. I’m 76. It’s quite nice to know that if I took a statin again it would save me from death. Frankly I’m not that keen on dying. Bearing in mind though the horrible side effects I had from the 10 years that I did take it I’m not sure that my never ending life would be worth living.
Great post, Dr. K. Thank you.
JanB, I feel the same – that even if statins were highly effective at prolonging life, I wouldn’t take them again in any circumstances. I mean quite apart from the quality of life, it is very hard to exercise while suffering muscle statin symptoms!
David Bailey, It was the weakness that got me. Within a few weeks my grip was so weakened that my tennis racquet would turn in my hand on contact with the ball. Happily for me, quite by chance, I read about muscle weakness in John Briffa’s blog in The Observer yonks ago and began supplementing with co-enzyme Q10 and within a week or three I was right as rain, though the crippling muscle and tendon cramps in my feet continued and worsened until I ceased taking the statin.
Dreadful stuff. The sheer misery of it.
JanB. In response to your description of the awful effect of statins on your physical state, I think it is timely to confirm to people just how terrible statins can be. This blog has many contributors describing aspects other than the statinisation of the human race, so I think I can be forgiven for repeating my experiences to reinforce the message.
Without being aware of the cause of my deteriorating vision (15 years ago), I mentioned to the optician about statins, but she said there was no connection, and put it down to the aging process ( at 56).
On finding myself unable to lift my arms up to shoulder height, and thus having difficulty in getting dressed, I was referred to a physiotherapist and received 12 weeks of unhelpful treatment. Again, I suggested that the statins could be involved…but that was not accepted….being put down to a trapped nerve, which would resolve with swimming.(no!)
I became so weak, that my husband noticed that he was walking ahead of me, whereas I had always been quick and nimble, outstriding others. The crunch came when I could no longer carry my handbag. That coincided wth me reading Dr K’s book, and I needed questions answering. Unfortunately, I was discouraged from believing the quack, and threw the book in the bin…but 6 years ago, things were so bad that I clutched at the proverbial straw, and re-purchased the book. By then, there seemed only one course of action available…..to get on with it myself, and stop all the meds. Over a ten year period I had become diabetic, hypertensive, inactive and despairing.
I believe statins were the cause.
I will never touch them again, even if the researchers promise extra lifespan. ( they never say how long, or how enjoyable, do they)
Jennifer – I suppose some people react more badly than others to the wonderful statins. Like you, I would never EVER take them again even though my diabetes nurse wants me to see a lipidologist, me with my perfect numbers…well, perfect to me. HDL 3.4 LDL 3.4 Trigs .06.
All stuff and nonsense, I say
Prof Colin Baigent’s introduction to the study was fairly impressive & believable but left me wondering why it still made no sense.
Thanks Dr. Kendrick for illuminating the failures in their hypothesis. Leaves me more comfortable that the skullduggery at the core can be exposed. Thank you again.
Unfortunately, most people see the headline and that is as far as they ever go. It is time consuming and difficult to read papers like this and look for the games that are played with the figures. Once you have done it, most people are not interested.
The equation use by most people is (O + E = T) Oxford + Expert = Truth
My equation is E + $ = C (Expert + Money = Corruption) I find it to be more accurate.
“My equation is E + $ = C (Expert + Money = Corruption). I find it to be more accurate”.
I quite agree. Even if we put all moral arguments on one side and adopt a purely objective attitude – as one would when studying beetles, say, or wolves – it is extremely hard to see how one could stop money from corrupting everything in its path. It seems to be a universal solvent.
As I said in a previous comment, the trouble arises from the growing number of people who believe that getting money is the supreme purpose of life. That is the principle that “classical economists” (false prophets) have adopted as the fundamental axiom of their system, because it helps to justify the organisation of society that enriches their sponsors.
I commend for study the work of Michael Hudson, an economist who deals with the world and people as they really are. His latest book, “And Forgive Them Their Debts”, explains how ancient societies 5,000 years ago understood the need for forgiveness of debts and freeing of debt-slaves; how that principle lies at the heart of the Old Testament; and how much of Jesus Christ’s teaching concerned the forgiveness of actual secular debt (rather than the figurative “forgiveness of trespasses” or sin).
Sorry for going off track here, but as U did mention money, the confrontation between a former BBC light entertainment host (who lost his fledgling media company as a result of nefarious activities of a major UK bank) at their May AGM with the chair & executive of the said bank (begins with LL) has significant parallels with our & your struggle for truth.
We need always to remember that, “Statements made by scientists are not always statements of science” (John Lennox ).
I am also concerned about the ‘Eminence Effect’, especially its growing influence on scientists, the media and therefore on the public. The greater the level of assumed eminence of the purveyor of science-related statements, the less likely are we to find much critical evaluation.
Dr K
That is an interesting équation. I had always assumed that the authors of papers such as this were sincere but misguided. I find it difficult to understand that they would effectively think, ” this is crap, but the money is good” ?
Don’t underestimate the power of cognitive dissonance
Sasha: Powerful indeed it is. There is only one reason they refuse to release the data: The entire house of cards would come crashing down, and a lot of people would be mad as hell. Profits would tank. This is the same reason CDC refuses access to the vaccine injury database they maintain (called VSD, for Vaccine Safety Datalink). They know damn well the damage they are causing, as does Sir Rory Collins.
Malcolm, can I pinch that equation. It seems so relevant in other areas of science not just medicine
Malcolm,
I get the feeling it might be possible to formulate a few questions from what you have written, and get the Daily Mail interested. I mean, the most obvious question to Rory Collins, would be, “Did the studies show any reduction in overall mortality associated with taking a statin – if so, how much?”. Maybe you could get the whole issue framed as a direct challenge to RC!
You could also ask about side effects. Mine were sufficiently severe that I wouldn’t consider taking statins whatever the gain in longevity.
You could also reveal the absurd truth that the data they use is not available to medical researchers in general.
The DM seems to publish articles from all sides – pro-statins, and anti-statins, pro-global warming and anti-global warming.
Maybe you could really nail the bastard (excuse my Klingon).
I just keep plugging away. My strategy is long-term.
We need a new category of expert: Expert Medical Paper Analyst.
Then the newspapers could have a headline “Expert Trashes Pro-statin Paper”. It’s the sort of scientific drama they love to print.
In response to the other recent Lancet study (they really are turning into a sh!tshower) if I was on Twitter I would write
Tim Noakes changed his mind in the face of better evidence. Walt Willett changed his mind in the face of better money.
Same applies to Collins and his ilk. Like Harvard they produce the best science money can buy.
Amused to see the comments on the recent BBC article referenced in the previous post, surprised to see so many seeing through the guff, and you were referenced several times, though still not enough to get you back into Wikipedia.
I see a future where meat is banned and statins are in the water supply.
chris c: Time for yellow vests everywhere.
Very good
And vaccines, both adult and juvenile, are mandatory.
Mmmm………., the meta-analysis, where you get a load of statistics, (because you are too lazy or poor to do a proper study) from small people number studies and pretend you are making an authoritave result appear. As stated in a recent link on the Dr K blogs, similar to a country who want’s to build a railroad. The country to the north uses a wide gauge, the country to the south uses a narrower gauge, so using meta-study techniques to mangle the figures they picked a gauge that was the average.
IF!!!! Cholesterol lowering was a good thing to do, then niacin wold be the thing to use. Simple, cheap, safe. NOT statins, not so cheap, and have a lot of undesirable effects, and they are toxic.
But most peple reading this would be thinking that anyway
https://youtu.be/M3fLHpA6CKQ Around 44 mins to get to niacin, but watch it all anyway.
AhNotepad,
I often tell people Uffe Ravnskov’s words:
“Old people with very high cholesterol live the longest”
Though that makes those of us with “low” cholesterol feel kinda bad sometimes. 😉
We need always to remember that, “Statements made by scientists are not always statements of science” (John Lennox ).
I am also concerned about the ‘Eminence Effect’, especially its growing influence on scientists, the media and therefore on the public. The greater the level of assumed eminence of the purveyor of science-related statements, the less likely are we to find much critical evaluation.
You’ve done it again Dr K. Another illuminating post. What astounds me is how the dickens these people get away with hiding data like this? Isn’t there Freedom of Information and all that? If I were you I would contemplate hiring a body guard. We don’t want to lose you!
There needs to be a new subject taught in schools worldwide. “Corruption”.
TS, I think it already is being taught in schools, many wonderful new drugs, exciting new foods, climate change, cancer is being cured, vitamins are dangerous, vaccines are necessary to prevent disease, governments care about their citizens, electric vehicles will reduce pollution. Most of this is corruption of facts.
AHNotepad, why do you feel that EVs won’t reduce pollution?
Sasha, regardless of propulsion, particulates are shed from the tyres and brakes. The exhaust particulate pollution is only around 2%. The NO2 limits in the EU are 40micrograms per cubic metre, If you use a gas cooker the NO2 can rise to well over 1200micrograms per cubic metre indoors. The amount of energy used in producing wind turbines and solar panels is unlikely to be recovered in the equipment’s lifetime. Drax (major UK power station) has been converted from coal to wood pellets sourced from trees grown in Canada, the effect of this is the pollution generated is equivalent to 3 MILLION EXTRA diesel cars, EV’s just shift the pollution, not reduce it. All this and we haven’t yet consiered the problems of the batteries. If you wanted to run on bio-fuels, given a road where the cars are doing 60 to 80kph, Electricity generation is never generated without pollution, and in this context, CO2 is not pollution.
EV’s, like climate change, cancer cures, statins and low fat diets, supported by a lot of misleading publicity.
AHNotepad, I am not sure where your numbers come from, but if you look at what people who do “cradle to grave” analysis are saying (it takes into account everything from fuel pathways to vehicle maintenance to engine or battery manufacturing and disposal), EVs require about 2500 BTUs of energy per mile while ICEs require about 5500 BTUs of energy per mile driven. Since all forms of energy production cause some form of pollution, EVs are less polluting because they are twice as efficient.
You can read more here, if you are interested
https://www.quora.com/How-efficient-are-electric-vehicles
But fuel use is not the only cause of pollution, hence my mention of the tyres and brakes, to mention but two. I’m afraid EV discussions are somewhat like the climate change and pharma discussions. Doctoring Data is good preliminary reading.
Yes, let’s wrap it up so as not to upset other readers, it’s a CVD blog after all.
It’s a blog that mainly focusses on CVD. However, not exclusively
Thank you, Dr Kendrick.
To others who may object to a discussion of EVs and larger issue of pollution: it’s not just in the context of promoting walking and bicycling. Pollution affects CVD rates. It’s quite possible that leaded gasoline lead to an increase in CVD and Russian coal miners, as Dr Kendrick points out in one of the books, have some of the worst CVD rates of all populations. Thus, it’s kind of related to what we talk about here.
Sasha: It is indeed, that is, air pollution causing early graves.
it <i.may cause early graves, but at an epidemiological level in most circumstances the best that can be claimed is “association”.
Sasha: Electric vehicles make little sense because of limited range, many-hours long recharging times (compared to minutes for liquid fuels), the very high cost of battery-pack replacements (the useful life being far shorter than an internal-combustion engine) and the units themselves, and the fact that people simply don’t want them-the subsidy is $7,500 per unit. They may very well reduce pollution, which is a good thing, but with the affordability of fossil fuels, which is likely for the foreseeable future, and the much greater practicality of existing technology, the only way they will make any headway is by government shoving them down our throats. And you can’t hear them coming; this is a hazard.
Sasha, most electric vehicles are charged overnight in people’s garages, when the sun don’t shine. So they don’t run on renewable energy. You could of course have a huge battery and store up power in the day, but they are very expensive and most people can’t afford one big enough to power the house and recharge the car.
For me, the big question is, why is it necessary to move two tons of motor car just to move 100 kg of human being? It’s a profligate misuse of energy.
Martin, yes there are some bottlenecks in technology and batteries is one of major ones. But I think lots of people are working on trying to solve the issues with batteries. China and India will ban the sales of all ICEs by 2030. What it will do in terms of R&D dollars going into EVs and renewables?
I agree that if we all swapped our cars for bicycles we would probably be much healthier and happier. But what are the chances of that happening? In my opinion, probably as much as those of us reverting to hunter gatherer lifestyle and enjoying all the health benefits that come with it.
And my question is – why are we discussing electric cars on this blog unless maybe it’s to promote walking or cycling?
JanB, happens from time to time, goes a bit off topic, but vehicle pollution is claimed to cause 40,000 deaths a year in London (as if anybody really knows. It’s one of those poorly supported statistics that is claimed to be arrived at scientifically but is another figure plucked out of nowhere). The same is being claimed in Germany but in that case there is a pressure group persuading politicians they must enforce the WHO limits of 40µg/m3 consequently hundreds of thousands of cars of only a few years old are being scrapped. Never mind that the air quality monitiors are positioned in places that give rubbish readings. That the cars are being scrapped so young is agruably increasing the stress on the hapless owners, so how many of them will have early CVD?
Don’t mind me, AhNotepad – I’m just a grumpy old woman. Sometimes though the blog goes off topic and sometimes turns acrimonious and makes me want to run for the hills. I agree absolutely with what you say about cars, pollution, waste, etc. Friends?
JanB: You’re not grumpy. I think you’re totally cool (that’s American for high praise).
Thank you, kind sir. 76 and cool is….er….cool.
JanB, discussions about diet get a bit contentious sometimes, yet diet doesn’t have much direct CVD connection, and the data collection to support the hypotheses is very questionable anyway. Then there’s the odd mention of vaccines, not much CVD link there either, problem in the end eventually comes no matter what. The latest thing I have come across which may have a CVD connection, it certainly has damaging effects on cells in general so hearts will probably be affected, and it will be here soon, is https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-the-roll-out-5g-a-mmw-technology-harmful-to-all-life
Sasha, you said ”lets wrap it up”, remember it was YOU who asked the question. 🤫
Here’s a major annoyance: my previous car did over 57 mpg. The Government put the tax up because of the “emissions”. My current one with a “low emission” engine is hard pushed to do 50 mpg, and the petrol engines are considerably worse. How can something that USES MORE FUEL have lower emissions? Different emissions would be more accurate. Of course selling more fuel is profitable for the oil companies and the government collects more tax.
Elon Musk’s prototype electric truck has one major advantage – for braking it turns the engine into a generator to recharge the batteries (some trams used to do this too) but the range is pathetic. When you take into account the cost of extra infrastructure to generate and distribute all the extra electricity the benefits of electric cars are majorly reduced.
Rapeseed/canola oil makes a half decent diesel, much preferable to eating the stuff. As the inimitable J Stanton wrote
“If you put it in a truck and the truck starts, it is not food”
Chris C
From one Chris to another, about putting canola oil diesel in trucks thus proving it is not food, I believe a hot car engine will run on whisky, but this seems a waste to me
I cringe whenever I hear that air pollution contributed to N deaths (where N is a large number), I remember Doctoring Data, and think:
1) The phrase “contributed to” is essentially meaningless in this context.
2) Even if you replace “contributed to” by “caused”, as Dr K would say,all deaths are certain, so the figure should be average loss of life per person caused by air pollution.
I suppose by now I simply assume that the peculiar way this information is expressed, is hiding something – probably a huge exaggeration.
I find it difficult to get worked up about air pollution these days, for the following reasons.
I was brought up in a London suburb, on the river. Within half a mile of our house was a coal-fired power station and a coal-gasworks. Most houses had coal fires in winter and many railway engines were coal-powered. There was also a tannery in the town which gave off smoke plus a horrendous stink.
Most winters we had severe brown, “pea-souper” smogs. I was very ill, aged 4, with a chest infection in the winter of 1953-4. Most subsequent winters I spent much of my time with a severe cough, struggling for breath at times.
To give some idea of the conditions: my Dad fitted a light to the near-side front bumper of the family car so he and Mum could see where the kerb was!; speeds were down to about 10 miles per hour, max.; I can remember cycling in the middle of the road unable to see either kerb or anything in front or behind unless it also had strong lights. Navigation was by stopping to read street signs as familiar landmarks were hidden. In the winter of 1962-3, the sulphur in the air took all the chrome plating off my bike, turning it into green-blue powder. Any snow turned black within a few hours.
Because of the power station and the gas works, the town was partially exempted from the clean air act for many years. The gasworks finally closed in the mid-sixties and the power station some time in the eighties. When I, my husband, and our young sons moved up to Leeds in 1974, my first reaction to the city was how clean everything was. It was the first time we had lived in a smokeless zone.
I agree that poorly maintained diesel engines, pumping out filthy black fumes, should be suppressed. I do know that the fumes one cannot see are harmful too, but I also know how much better things are than they once were. Progress needs to continue but there is no need to pretend that things are as bad as they used to be.
Another great blog Dr Kendrick, thanks for keeping an old geezer informed.
There has come to light a fundamental problem with probably virtually all clinical trials and meta analyses in medicine. This is exemplified by a paper: AL Fisher, JD Medaglia and BT Jeronimus;
Proc Nat Acad Sci 2018; 115: E6106-E6115. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1711978115.
This paper discusses effects of nonrandomness in clinical trial anaylsis and the errors in interpretation that can arise. Put briefly, either minorities in a large population chosen at random can be swamped out and their difference in response from the mean suffocated, or a minority can have so distinct positive effects as to distort the conclusions from the unaffected majority. Clinical trials generally fail to stratify patients properly before random allocation and the phenomenon of Simpson’s Paradox can render the conclusions invalid. This may well be the case here. Fisher’s paper is one of the most important I have read for some time. In its worst case, virtually all clinical trials are valueless. And applying meta analysis to them actually makes matters worse.
Commentary by Marcia Angell (former editor of NEJM) and Richard Horton (former editor of Lancet) essentially said that the bulk of published reports of clinical studies is, if not valueless, at a minimum, seriously flawed. Dr. K has had links to Angell’s and Horton’s commentaries in some of his previous blogs. If reports on clinical trials are unbiased, why do analyses show a disproportionate finding of favorable results in “studies” funded by a drug’s manufacturer, as opposed to those funded by an independent entity? If the data and conclusions are valid, the source of funding for the study should be irrelevant.
I don’t know how reports of clinical trials are regulated in the UK, but, in the US, the FDA does not require publication of all trials. Those with unfavorable results need not be made public, or even reported to the FDA.
Thank you for the link, I look forward to reading it. Fascinating.
I have learned to take zero notice of media comment about such studies. About the only thing that you learn is that there was a study. Abstracts are full of lies and the authors’ wishes (not what the studies show). Your critique is so valuable: the twists and turns that the authors go through to try and hype the results still leaves me aghast. I cannot understand how they can live with themselves. I suppose the money they get paid helps them a bit.
I did notice that Zoe Harcombe pointed out that despite all the hype, the study’s own results failed to show any statistically significant benefit for the over 75s anyway (see Fig 5)
Follow the money
Maybe it’s not only money but also some cognitive dissonance. Must be very uncomfortable…
The study concludes this themselves: “There is less definitive direct evidence of benefit in the primary prevention setting among patients older than 75 years”
In other words, there’s no point in taking statins if you’re over 75.
But then they add this: “…but evidence supports the use of statin therapy in older people considered to have a sufficiently high risk of occlusive vascular events.”
I guess they had to put in something to satisfy their sponsors, although it’s unclear what they mean by “sufficiently high risk”. Possibly it’s to help doctors who are prescribing statins like mad to earn a bonus from the pharma companies, and who would be resentful if told to stop prescribing statins to over-75s. They can always claim that in their opinion there was a “sufficiently high risk” to justify prescribing statins.
And let’s face it, a lot of people want statins because they firmly believe a statin is all that stands between them and a deadly heart attack. I saw this myself when I worked for a medical aid that didn’t want to pay for statins (this was in the early days when Lipitor had just come out). There was a near-riot from our members and the policy was reversed pronto.
A retired professor in a completely different field pointed out that the actual facts (if there are any) will be hidden in the data.The discussion will spin things in the direction required by the sponsors, the abstract will take this further and the press release may have no bearing on the actual study.
Exactly.
As stated above by JanB….10 years on statins made my life very disabling. 5 years without them has been life-enhancing.
My blood sugars became erratic last year and I was referred to a consultant for its management (or so I was led to believe)….only to find out that the letter of referral was because my cholesterol was ‘high’ at 7.5!!!
I hasten to add that any discussion of ‘cholesterol’ never entered the consultation. I read between the lines….the consultant must, fortunately, be in our camp.
This statin/cholesterol topic is an unholy minefield, driven by money and fuelled by apparently corrupt, but influential organisations.
I am so pleased that 10 years ago I stumbled across Dr Kendrick’s original book, and ultimately joined this uplifting and sensible resource to keep me informed. Nothing a read has changed my decision to opt out of the pandemonium.
Iv been pushed by several Drs and Consultants into trialling statins. I am of a certain age. But none ever suited me, thankfully. Then I discovered that there’s a ‘minus bell curve’ for women over 65 taking statins. I now repeat that mantra and have not been bothered since. Means they know I’m right not to take them.
“CTT will not let anyone else see the data they hold. Including all the data on adverse events [side-effects] and serious adverse events. It is kept completely secret. ”
Ha! Tell-tale sign of a shyster, er.. scientist, at work. Remember Michael ‘hockey stick’ Mann going so far as to commit contempt of court to hide his so-called “data” that proved we were all doomed to fry in the pan of globull warming?
“It’s not just an annoyance, this actually puts people in harm’s way.”
Soon as they successfully make the argument that your words are putting people in ‘harm’s way’ they feel justified in stuffing a sock in your mouth.
“Science has taken a turn toward darkness.”
-Lancet Editor-in-Chief, Richard Horton
repsort: Interesting that the hockey stick was based upon a single set of data: tree-ring data from the bristlecone pine (this is a species of harsh, dry high elevation deserts of the Western U.S.; they can live 5,000 years). All the other tree-ring data sets from around the world showed no such pattern. The increased growth in the bristlecone pine (Pinus aristàta) may have been a response to the increase in atmospheric CO2.
Michael Mann was harassed in court by a group funded by the Koch brothers and other dirtbags in the filthy fuels industries. Their goal had nothing to do with seeking scientific truth — it was meant to badger him into bankruptcy. The “data” they demanded was his private correspondences.
I’m really getting fed up having to read climate change nonsense in this blog — I come here to read about heart disease, not to listen to smug know-it-alls pontificate on unrelated subjects.
Mark Sanders: Like you, I come here to learn about CVD (and overall health). But what I said is true: the hockey stick has no basis in scientific evidence. It is very unfortunate that politics has infested the IPCC reports, as it has. There is too much uncertainty to make the sort of alarming prognostications the media often make.
If you come here to learn about CVD, then why don’t you leave your comments about climate change on a blog that talks about . . . (wait for it) . . . climate change! The Koch brothers thank you for your help.
And yet, this post of yours has nothing to do with heart disease. Climate change gets frequent mention here because of the over-arching theme of corruption in science and its slide into propaganda, of which the climate change hoax is a most prominent example. Those who are irritated could simply scroll past those comments with which they disagree. It would reduce their stress levels.
I think understanding corruption in science is vital – because modern science has enough skeletons in its cupboard, that it doesn’t want to see any field crumble, lest the rest falls with it.
“Doctoring Data” illustrates in graphic detail much of what has happened to science. Money determines the theories, and the theories distort the experimental conclusions!
The similarities in the rhetoric between the various suspect fields is itself suggestive. We have ‘Climate Deniers’, ‘AIDS Deniers’, and ‘Cholesterol Deniers’.
That last phrase is perhaps less commonly used, but The Guardian has a headline about it:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/oct/30/butter-nonsense-the-rise-of-the-cholesterol-deniers
Mark, please remember that phrase when next you read about ‘Climate Deniers’ in the Guardian!
Indeed, read that article and note the scary parallels between Medical science and Climate science.
David Bailey: Actually, there is first-rate medical science and climate science being done today. It is the media who make a hash of things by promoting the interests of their patrons (pharma) in their coverage of medical issues, and the Left in their alarmism about global warming. Why the Left has taken up the cudgel of imminent climate horror is a complete mystery to me. I knew nothing about climate science until a commenter here, two or three years ago, mentioned Dr. Curry’s blog, Climate, etc. I since have read vast numbers of published climate-related papers. The only conclusions it is possible to draw are these. 1. Earth’s climate is slowly warming and sea levels slowly rising, and have been since the end of the Little Ice Age early in the nineteenth century. 2. What data we have is inadequate to accurately predict the level of warming or sea level rise (currently about 3 mm/year) which will occur in this century with any degree of confidence; all the IPCC scenarios are built upon computer modeling using this inadequate data. 3. World CO2 emissions will not be reduced sufficiently to make any meaningful difference in its concentration, and it is entirely possible that the CO2 concentration plays little causal role in the warming. 4. Earth’s climate is so extraordinarily complex, it is impossible at this point for any one scientist to have a handle on the big picture. And finally: 5. The mitigation strategies governments are rolling out are causing real damage to real people, especially those on the lower part of the economic spectrum, and pissing people off. Thus, the yellow vests. They make me feel hope for sanity possibly prevailing.
Just because some conspiracy theories are true does not believe that all conspiracy theories are true. Just because these experts over here are screwing up does not mean that all experts are screwing up in every field..
I think people should educate themselves about confidence games and understand how con men work. One of the first principles in conning someone is to convince the target how smart they are: “You and I, we know better than those fools over there. You can trust me because you are as smart as I am. We know these experts are wrong.” If you are an American and listen to talk radio and believe those blowhards, you are indeed being conned.
Mark Sanders: Right you are. The con game is probably as old as the human species. Coming to see this clearly, that much of what we’ve been told is a con, or the result of ignorance, has led me to be skeptical of nearly everything, to look at the widest possible body of evidence before making up my mind, but not closing it to new evidence. I’ve never listened to talk radio (I presume you refer to Right wing talk radio). For decades I’ve listened to Pacifica, and still enjoy the cultural programming, but came to realize the political stuff was often just as unreliable or simply untrue, either a con or the result of ignorance. This didn’t produce cognitive dissonance in me; it was, in fact, intellectually liberating. Dr. Kendrick, and the thoughtful commenters here have been a great help to me in this journey of truth-seeking. I don’t like what the Koch brothers do with they’re money (except support for the arts, which is a good thing) any more than you do, but this is just a distraction, part of the con.
Speaking of cons, by an astonishing coincidence, “The Great Cholesterol Con” arrived today, and a fine read it is. So far, favorite quote: “One of the first duties of the physician is to educate the masses not to take medicine.” Sir William Osler, MD (1849-1919) My, how times have changed!
On the subject of being conned, doesn’t being conned usually involve the “connee” giving up something to the “conner” without compensation? If I am asked to believe that climate change, formerly known as global warming, is a hoax, I am asked to give up nothing. Not my car, my money, nor my standard of living. If I am asked to believe climate change, formerly known as global warming, is real, I am asked to give up my entire way of life, including vast sums of money in the form of taxes, for no compensation whatsoever except the assurance I am doing my part to save the planet. And I am also told I am better, more moral, and smarter than those who “deny”. So I wonder; who is being conned? Also, “Global Warming” was supposedly a well established fact. It was everywhere in the news constantly; a world wide phenomenon. But when its predictions failed to materialize, it morphed into “Climate Change”. I wonder, who has the power to change the name of such a massive, all encompassing theory literally overnight, such that “global warming” was never mentioned again by its acolytes?
Throughout the recorded history of humanity, those who wish to gain power over others have told everyone else that certain things absolutely must be done to save us all – or yourself. These things have always required sacrifices – of one sort or another. Financial, physically painful, repudiation of pleasure or, at the extremes, human sacrifice. Once you have started causing yourself some sort of pain, you have become ‘invested’ in their power system, making it far more difficult to rebel.
On a small scale I gaze at wind-farms ruining the landscape when I am out walking, and I am told ‘this is the price we must all pay to save the planet.’
Can you say more about “vast sums of money in the form of taxes”? Where are you asked to do that?
In my opinion, the biggest thing we have to give up when confronted with the fact that everything we do has an ecological footprint, is not our “lifestyle”. Our lifestyle doesn’t change much by giving up plastic bags or paying a few cents more for gasoline. What we have to give up are certain ideas about ourselves and those are hardest to let go of.
Sasha, I’m sure you must like playing the devil’s advocate. The “vast” sums of money in the form of taxes comprise the higher electricity bills we have to pay because of the cost of producing wind turbines and solar panels. There s also the land they take up which means less land for food production. There are the taxes from producing bio fuels often from food crops, but also from ecosystem-destroying palm oil. Taxes inflicted on all of us because of the few deceived users of not so “smart” meters. The cost of high tech vechiles which are supposed to use less fuel, but don’t. I had to let go of a 22year old 405 estate which did 52mpg, I now have a Skoda estate with a smaller more efficient engine which does 50mpg. The one thing it does do, is cost me a lot more in maintenance, without which the various efficient computer controlled systems will fail.
The list goes on.
AHNotepad, I ask these questions not because I like to play devil’s advocate but because I think people should be able to back up their statements.
You’ve said earlier that EVs are not more efficient than ICEs, they simply shift pollution elsewhere. I gave a link to “cradle to grave analysis” which shows that EVs use 2500 BTUs of power per mile driven vs 5500 BTUs for ICE cars. However you generate power, whether through fossil fuels, nuclear or by renewables, the end user products (cars) that uses less power to generate the same amount of work are by definition more efficient. You could’ve rebutted that but instead you referred me to “Doctoring Data” as an example of human follies. What does “Doctoring Data” have to do with it except your desire to link the unlinkable?
Now you say we pay vast sum of taxes “in the form of higher electricity bills to produce wind turbines and solar panels”. What does that mean? You don’t pay for electricity to produce wind turbines and solar panels, you pay for electricity because you used it to power your refrigerator. Most people who install solar panels find that their electricity bills are greatly reduced or eliminated. Do governments provide subsidies to install solar panels? Sure. Governments have a long history of subsidizing behavior which they think is beneficial to society, why should solar panels be an exception?
Do wind turbines and solar panels “take up land that could be used for food production” as you claim? Not likely, as more often than not they are located in areas not very suitable for food production. In contrast, try growing food downstream from a strip coal mining operation, to use just one example.
Biofuels are a big waste of taxpayer dollars and agricultural land but that has nothing to do with EVs, solar, wind, or the issue of environmental pollution and efficient renewable technologies. Just because statins are pretty bad doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take antibiotics for a C. diff infection.
I am sorry the government made you swap your 52 mpg car for something more expensive. I’m sure governments do a lot of dumb stuff but that doesn’t invalidate the fact that pollution is real and that however we generate power, it’s better to do it in a more sustainable way and to use products that are more energy efficient.
Sasha: I always appreciate your comments. In reality, at least in California, solar is rigged to increase the wealth of the wealthy class. Here it is not possible for a homeowner to be a net solar producer. We are limited to installing no more than 98-99% of capacity to produce an equivalent amount to our previous year’s usage. My bills reduced slightly after I had it installed, but they still increase 1.5% per year, and if I produce more in a year than I use, PG&E credits me a small fraction per KWH of what they sell it to others for. Theoretically, wind and solar can be a useful adjunct to powering our lives, but are not, and never will be viable for the bulk of our energy needs, and once the politicians get involved, they invariably screw things up royally. Remember when nuclear power was “too cheap to meter?” That didn’t work out too well, but there are some fascinating new nuclear technologies being developed which use molten salt, or something like that, for cooling the core, that sound very promising. We are doing terrible damage to Earth by the way we live, but I have little confidence in government addressing it sensibly.
Gary: I know quite a few middle class people in Hawaii who are quite happy with their solar and told me that it pays to install it if you can afford upfront costs. The problem lies not with solar in this case but in your grid providers who want to also sell you power. If things were done in the way that’s good for environment and everyone installing solar, you could be charged for maintaining the grid and become a power producer. But grid providers are entrenched and will lobby politicians to stop or slow down adoption of these technologies because it’s an existential threat to their business model.
It’s the same story for nuclear which people worked on adopting back in the 50’s and then it got stopped. I would not be surprised if fossil fuel companies had something to do with it.
It’s the same story with EVs. Tesla didn’t develop technology from scratch, it’s been around for decades. But ICE companies have hundreds of billions in sunk costs and full scale adoption of EVs is an existential threat to their business model. They say it outright, Google CEO of VW talking about it.
Sasha: You must have some intelligent people in state government in Hawaii, something we sorely lack here in California. I installed solar because I thought it would have benefits for all; not so sure now. I would love to be a net producer, but it is illegal here, except for those who are off the grid (a tiny number).
Gary: Yes, Hawaii has a strong current of Native Hawaiian culture which reflects on state policies.
Sasha, I will not reply to your posts in future as it causes controversy because you do not receive what I say in the way I intended.
Solar panels and wind turbines DO take up land that could be used for food production. In the east of England where I live, there are several solar installations on many tens of acres of land that only a few years ago produced food crops. The same for wind turbines, though they do allow some crops to be grown underneath, but quite a bit of land is taken up by access roads and foundations that don’t provide crops.
The government had nothing to do with the demise of my 52mpg car, that was caused by rust.
That is all.
PS You keep asking off-topic questions which cause others (including yourself) to complain when the discussion drifts.
Additionally “vast” is a relative term. Sasha may be well off and so the price increases on everyday goods and services are possibly trivial. Those on low incomes still suffer the same increases, but as a proportion of their income, are “vast” and often mean they are driven into poverty, which arguably can give rise to substantial health issues. It is certainly known that those in low income households generally die younger than those in high income hoseholds, there is a similar correlation with health in general.
The reason (or reasons) the poor suffer from worse health has nothing to do with what’s being discussed. Once again you’re trying to show correlation between things simply to confirm your biases. In my opinion…
I agree with you, Sasha. A small moderation of our wasteful (and often lazy) habits can make a huge difference. We in the developed world, East and West, gobble up an unfair share of Earth’s finite resources. Climate change aside, the amount of pollution created via plastic is mind boggling and shameful.
Just finished reading “Factfulness” by Hans Rosling – an eye opening book which helps to put everything into proportion.
Gary Ogden,
Good comment and a fine summary of the state of climate science as I understand it.
“Why the Left has taken up the cudgel of imminent climate horror is a complete mystery to me.”
I think it follows from the American Progressive Era of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The idea was to put “trained experts” into government to manage and improve society, to put science in the forefront of policy-making. Hence, if the “experts” tell us we need to stop presumed man-made warming (or fat-eating, just to return to topic), then that’s what we must do. QED.
The Progressives were big on this kind of social control, and many good Progressives supported eugenics to “improve” the race. The embarrassment of the Nazis put an end to that aspect of Progressivism, but the idea of experts and concerted government action for progress and social change persists.
Of course, science is a process which leaves us “knowing” differently today than we “knew” yesterday. It’s easy to forget to that we will “know” differently tomorrow than we “know” today, and our Progressive overlords and betters conveniently ignore this reality.
Same applies to medicine, nutrition, and so on. It’s surely more complicated than I suggest, but I think the Left’s proclivity for social control plays a big role.
LA_Bob: Good analysis. This I more or less knew, yet I always think “follow the money.” In any case, I find learning about CVD and Medicine in general so fascinating that I’m finished with commenting about climate.
I don’t want to take this topic too far adrift, although it seems Dr. Kendrick has given his tacit approval. So I won’t respond to any critiques of my comment except to say that this is a wonderful, unique commenting community. Everyone remains very civil and actually addresses the arguments put forth, rather than engaging in personal attacks. I have made similar comments on other sites, and you would not believe the vitriol that is unleashed. So thank you, everyone, for accepting me into your circle.
Gary Ogden – PGE is a corporation which is very happy to screw you over the energy they use and sell from your solar installation. If they played fair and square, then perhaps you’d have a different idea on the benefits of solar energy, but this is an issue of corporate corruption, not leftist hanky-panky. Note that there are people who are “off the grid” who are able to supply all the energy they need from solar and wind energy among other things. Also note even though you don’t see a change in your monthly bills, your taxes are being used to subsidize all the filthy fuel industries – coal, oil and natural gas. Nuclear energy would never ever have gotten off the ground if it weren’t for massive tax credits and subsidies as well as laws limiting their legal liabilities over the decades. So to decide whether solar and wind cost more or not, you need to know where all the money is coming from and going to. Much of the Koch brothers’ wealthy comes from income taxes that we pay.
Mark Sanders, there is no “clean” fuel. to label “fossil” fuels (though there is an argument that they are abiotic and not from “fossils”) as “filthy” gets a bit emotive rather than trying to deal with the problem, if indeed it is a problem. Solar energy is assumed to be clean because the user end does not show what went into getting to that stage. In the earlier days (and it may still be happening) the production of solar panels in China resulted in toxic wast e being taken rom the factories, out into the countryside by the lorry load, and tipped on peasants’ land with no regard for either environmental concerns, or concerns for the hapless peasants. Another problem was the cleaner used for the panels, being 24,000 times as potent as CO2 in it’s greenhouse effect, allegedly. This gets us into a problem of course since CO2 is not really a pollutant, whereas the cleaner probably is.
The point is, what is a “clean” fuel? unless it is sunlight directly used in photosynthesis in plants.
It is frightening that these charlatans have any traction at all and are free to spout misinformation and outright lies to enhance their own standing and wealth. And then some dickhead gets you removed from Wikipedia. Pointless asking what he was afraid of you doing. Speaking the truth I would guess.
Hi Dr Kendrick
Thank you again for your excellent detective work, highlighting the bigger picture (as usual).
Interestingly the same news media has a link to the effect of statins for patents over 75, which explains that there is an even more significant effect of taking statins for women.
https://www.express.co.uk/life-style/health/850703/type-2-diabetes-statins-side-effects-drug
‘Researchers from the University of Queensland found women over 75 face a 33 per cent higher chance of developing diabetes if they are taking statins. Experts said the risk also increase to over 50 per cent for women taking higher doses of statins.’
As a 64 year old patient who has had a total cholesterol levels around 8mmol/L for 30 years (occasionally as high as 13.9 after intermittent fasting) but a ZERO CAC SCORE.
Many others on LCHF diets are finding the same (RAISED TC levels but LOW or VERY LOW risk when having CAC checked.
Imagine when ALL patients find out the truth, then require a CAC score before considering taking stains for the rest of their lives.
Keep up the good work.
Strange that, that statins are EVEN more effective for older women. The info insert in my statin pack of yore stated that statins aren’t suitable for women over 60.
This all smacks of desperation to me.
JanB: Desperation it indeed is. We see this also in the vaccine promoters. The internet has allowed the spread of knowledge much farther and wider than ever before. Three cheers for the internet, for the dissemination of knowledge far and wide! It is pharma who are a cult. The big tech companies are working furiously to put a lid on it.
Thank you for making clear the funding for this trial. There is so much fear mongering these days with lies and half truths that it is good to get your views. Keep up the good work.
Brilliant post, thankyou.
😠. Also thank you for your courage and persistence!
Enough is enough now, isn’t it about time someone from government got involved here. If nothing else the NHS is wasting millions (Billions ?) paying for pointless medication. Or is it just a matter of handing over a few party donations and bribing some key politicians ?
I don’t understand why you were saying that there is no reduction in overall mortality. Chart number six I believe in the appendix clearly shows a reduction in mortality of about 700 people compared to control, though it does indicate that there was no reduction in mortality the one that was over 75 with the mortality reductions being concentrated in younger populations.
Given the dodgy background, inherent conflict of interest, how can we take any of the data seriously ?
Dr. K—I love the rapid-fire attack on shoddy method—power corrupts and absolute power—well, you know better than most—people sacrifice their liberty because of fear, and place their trust in authority. There may be another revolution taking place, around the world, based on a general distrust of authority and concentration of power. Thesis–antithesis–synthesis. The never ending battle against hubris and greed. I appreciate your efforts and your style. A growing minority of voices can turn the tide.
Thank you as always. A colleague who knew I was interested in all this, after I had read Gary Taubes, sent me the link to your blog ages ago, and I have valued every word I have read from you.
Dr. Kendrick, Many thanks again for using your Big Pharma decoder ring
to allow me to understand the skullduggery that passes for medicine these days. I disseminate your information to many to advance harm reduction and critical thinking. With respect and gratitude .
Thank you, Dr Kendrick. I have appreciated your common sense and academic rigor. I made my own ‘shout of protest’ videos about statins and the CTT and include them here if you are interested. The current societal pressures to limit freedom of speech are terrifying and your comment on Orwell is apt.
Corruption of evidence based medicine
Questioning the cholesterol treatment guidelines
I’m glad my mom stopped taking the statin she was on. It was causing her severe joint problems, effecting her ability to walk. No mention to me from mom that she has read any articles mentioned on this latest statin paper. She may be pro modern medicine but she isn’t a fool.
Dr. Kendrick, can you not just send in your response to all the major newspapers that published the Lancet paper so that there is a balanced view?
They will not publish such things.
It’s like when RFK, Jr asked the chairman of Fox (whose name I forget) to get him on the air to be interviewed on the subject of vaccines. The chairman is kind of like an adopted uncle to RFK, Jr., funny enough. He told him if he puts him on he would have to fire the people interviewing him.
Sasha: Yes Roger Ailes did say that. Then he got caught up in sexual harassment allegations, left Fox, and passed away not long after. Tucker Carlson did interview RFK, Jr. on Fox in 2018, to my immense gratification. Nobody else in media will ever put him on, other than Sharyl Attkisson, one of the few real journalists left.
Yes, I think Roger Ailes also said that in non-election years about 70% of their advertising revenues are from pharma which puts some constraints on what they can talk about.
The press will publish anything that lands on the desk, make a headline and wind up their readers. Try the search “Statins Daily Telegraph”
https://www.google.com/search?q=statins+daily+telegraph&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b
You’ll find as much anti as pro statin.
For me, cholesterol levels are an indicator, part of the response process to endothelial damage. Taking meds to bring the level down is like taking meds to bring the troponin levels down in an MI.
Thank you, Dr. Kendrick. A sad state of affairs when highly-educated professionals can repeatedly lie to themselves, and others, and not even notice it. Surely some of these folks are statisticians? Maybe not, although they did publish some numbers, just not the important ones.
Good afternoon Dr Kendrick
Thank you for your posting – I found it of great interest.
I celebrate my seventy fifth birthday in a few days time – and I know that I am not immortal! I am not about to start taking a statin simply to reduce the chance of a fatal heart problem. In short, something will kill me sooner or later – it may be a fatal illness or a fatal accident with a bus but the inevitable will happen. Stains can never stop me from dying.
Keep up the very good work Best regards Howard Taylor
________________________________
Could one not demand access to the data under the Freedom of Information Act?
No, you cannot.
Excellent, Dr. Kendrick. Contrary to what you might read if you look at what the troll behind Skeptic from Britain has written, I’m a Truzzi-style skeptic, and I don’t forget to be skeptical of what I like. So I’m very interested in how the “mainstream” responds to criticism. I don’t just look at one side, no matter how plausible it might seem. I’m sure you understand the idea.
I was in hospital recently after an operation. Most of the patients on the ward were elderly. I regularly heard nurses giving patients their statin and diabetes medication. What a boon for Sir Rory Collins and his friends.
A doctor later reviewed my notes and said, “We need to think about starting you on a statin.” I replied, “No thank you. My brother began to lose his memory taking statins and I’d rather keep mine.”
On the positive side, in a pre-operation meeting, a senior nurse told me she’s taken her father off statins and his leg pains had quickly disappeared. I don’t blame doctors or nurses for the guidelines imposed on them.
Thank you. It’s so good to be able to turn quickly to someone who can analyse papers like this and explain what is really being said. This site is so valuable.
“Whilst they reduce serious cardiac events, previously published results demonstrate they do not reduce total serious adverse events.
Which means that they are, wait for it, absolutely and completely useless.”
Am I alone in not being able to make sense of this?
Many people find this difficult to understand.
There are many possible serious adverse events. A drug, that works, should reduce the total number of serious adverse events. If it does not, then all that is happening is that you are shifting serious events from one ‘column’ to another.
For example, figures for illustration purposes.
Statins reduce the number of non-fatal heart attacks – a serious adverse event – by 2% (a good thing)
However, they increase the rate of diabetes – a serious adverse event – by 2% (a bad thing)
Total number of adverse events is unchanged. Non-fatal heart attacks down 2%, diabetes up 2%.
If you only highlight the adverse events that went down, you are providing a biased and unbalanced report.
Thank you once more for being a voice of sanity in medicine.
Serious cardiac events are a part of total serious adverse events. If you have a reduction in serious cardiac events with statins but the total of serious adverse events stays the same, that means that statins increased the rest of serious adverse events to keep the total as before.
Jonathan: This paper is the last gasp of air for an utterly discredited hypothesis crafted by that supremely capable charlatan and pit bull, Ancel Keys. The great tragedy is that the sheep will believe it to be actual science, when it is nothing more than marketing.
Thank you for this analysis, Dr Kendrick, especially for pointing out some of the subtler aspects most of us wouldn’t know to look out for.
Rule number one. Look for what is not said – the dog that did not bark in the night.
In any clinical trial the number one outcome is reduction in overall mortality – not mentioned, did not happen.
Then next outcome is reduction in fatal events – not mentioned, did not happen.
It saves trawling through the convoluted medical stats.
The emperor not wearing any clothes again ?
Have research papers been compromised to this degree all along, and only now, with instant thoughtful skepticism any time of night or day, is it becoming more apparent?
Read Vinay Prasad’s “Medical Reversal”. Read what John Ioannidis thinks of research papers. Light is showing through the cracks. Everybody, get a crowbar.
Thank you for doing all the work for us!
What a brilliant Sunday morning read. Exhilarating, shocking, and thought provoking, at one point I burst out laughing at the sheer exuberance of the writing! Nice one Doc. My wife said, they won’t let him get away with writing this will they? I said, they don’t have any choice, all he’s doing is proving 2+2 = 4
It makes me so angry that supposed reputable newspapers continue to publish articles written by so called ‘health reporters’ who have no medical knowledge themselves and fail to carry out in-depth medical research. These regular articles on statins are simply based on press releases sent to them by the usual statin cheer leaders. It’s just a game to them and easy money all round funded by a corrupt pharmaceutical industry not interested in patient care only profit. Unfortunately the NHS is a part of this game too. The trust and confidence I once had for the organisation has completely gone apart from Dr Malcolm Kendrick who’s an unusually outspoken and honest GP. Most stay silent because there’s a fee for every statin prescribed and I bet ‘they’ don’t take statins…,
I suffered a life-threatening 20mg Lipitor/statin-induced adverse drug reaction (ADR) in 2008 and almost died of polyneuropathy, rhabdomyolysis/muscle wasting and heart failure that’s been covered-up by the NHS ever since. I have photos of the physical injuries as proof of evidence. I’ve done a great deal of research since then and a couple of websites exposing the truth about statins curiously disappeared from the internet but fortunately I had copied the vital information: (1) A six-year statin drug trial (2006-2011) on 145 rats Statin Effects on Heart and Skeletal Muscle carried out by the scienceandresearch/homeoffice.gov.uk. I asked for the test results but my request was refused. (2) The Neuropathy Assocation in the US published an informative article Medication-Induced Neuropathies by Louis H Weimer MD in which statins are among many other drugs listed that cause polyneuropathy. Another significant website: Major Side Effects of Statin Drugs Statin Answers is still active.
I believe two things should happen to protect patients from serious harm and death. (A) Mandatory reporting of every ADR by all healthcare workers to the appropriate health authorities. (B) Mandatory publishing of all drug trial test results. Only then patients will be protected from unnecessary serious harm and death caused by dangerous prescription drugs. Everyday GP’s surgeries and A&E are overwhelmed with thousands of older patients suffering from serious statin side effects and a drug they don’t need. Lowering cholesterol is extremely dangerous and a medical scandal. There needs to be a public inquiry into this Nazi-like mass medicating of vulnerable older patients and the NHS made accountable.
“Lowering cholestoral is dangerous” fact but that shud be shouted from the rooftops.
As regards reporting side effects of statins, in my experience they are not immediate, they are insidious, bit of the old boiling frog syndrome. By the time it’s crept up on you the victim, you are many months away from your first treatment. At this stage you have no idea why U are the way you are.
Am I getting old? If this is old age creeping up by God it’s not pretty. Anxiety, sleeplessness, fear – am I dying? Is it blood pressure tabs? Blood thinners? Thyroid tabs ? No real concern from the “experts” . I got a laugh from the cardio assistant in an interview style process after describing my symptoms. You do research & discover there are others on statins with same symptoms. You remove the problem and life slowly reverts to normal.
About three months ago the physiotherapist we use , highly professional and she sits on the medical council in South Africa , asked me what I recommend for her husband’s muscle pains.
After a 6 heart bypass in 2006 with cholesterol of 4, I started a company that produces natural products that targets mainly inflammation and many other symptoms .
Her husband is an advocate in the High Court in South Africa . I asked her two questions .
Was he put on statins and does he suffer from brain fog . It was affirmative for both . She told me he kept on asking her the same questions. I advised her to tell him to stop taking statins .
Three weeks later he was back to normal .
Last year I climbed the 670 odd steps of the Eiffel Tower in one go after walking around 20 kms exploring Paris the day, I only use my products after experiencing very unpleasant side effects on statins . I stopped using them around 7 years ago. I am 68 soon. Q10 ,magnesium and potassium are very important .Vit K2 with D3 ( we have free sunshine in south africa ).
Statin drugs are killers.
The next thing we know, the statin manufacturers are going to be telling us, based on the same kind of pseudoscience, that every man, woman and child should be required to take statins starting on the day of birth in order to create “heard immunity” to heart disease. Of course that blatant nonsense will be published in the Lancet, and all the major newspapers will uncritically echo it as front page news. Then the state of California will be the first in the United States of Authoritarianism to require every child to be taking statins in order to attend any school, public or private, the same as they do now for all the CDC-recommended vaccines. That insane law will be passed with the enthusiastic endorsement of a majority of California’s voting citizens, most of whom have already been brain damaged by the neurotoxic adjuvants in all of the vaccines they were administered as a child, by all of the other medications they are already taking, and by all the poisons like glyphosate (Roundup) that the FDA has approved for unrestricted presence in the food supply.
No need to worry Greg, https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP79B00752A000300070001-8.pdf
By the way, having been permanently injured by statins myself I am a huge fan of Dr. Kendrick. I used to enjoy walking about 20 to 25 miles per week at an average pace of 3.2 miles per hour, non-stop. Since the statins (in particular Pravastatin) took their toll by creating intermittent claudication — which took about 6 months before I figured out what the hell was going on, stopped taking them and fired the cardiologist who prescribed them — the best I can do anymore is 1/4 mile at about 2.5 miles per hour, a ten minute rest, and then 1/4 mile nearly limping back to the starting point at less than 2 miles per hour. Needless to say, thanks to the permanent damage done several years ago by the statins, I can no longer get the kind of exercise that would actually improve my heart health and probably extend my life. That crap really ought to be forced off the market entirely and it’s producers and promoters ought to be sent to prison for crimes against humanity.
And by the way, my cholesterol levels were never particularly high in the first place. The statins were simply prescribed automatically as “best medical practice.” Fortunately I eventually learned from a holistic dentist that my three heart attacks over the course of seven years were all most likely the result of inflammation caused by toxins produced by anaerobic bacteria that were thriving in a badly infected root-canalled tooth from 30 years before my first heart attack. I promptly had him pull that tooth and clean up the infection in the jaw bone above it, and today I am entirely symptom free. I think what pisses me off most is that the second and third heart attacks, bypass operation and intermittent claudication could all have be easily avoided if only my cardiologist had known enough to ask me “Greg, have you ever had a root canal?” after my first relatively mild attack at the age of 54. Instead I ended up with open heart surgery and a single bypass (right descending artery) seven years later.
Greg what you can try is using Vit C with MSM and see if it helps .
As with most (all?) social ills, a system that grew without intelligent design is the root cause. (Intelligent design can also be a problem if “what they know ain’t so.”) There are methods of amplifying the intelligence of decisions, but mostly they are not used. If it were not corrupted, the journal system would be a method. But it is corrupted, both literally (funding!) and figuratively (confirmation bias for the “consensus view” that has never actually reached true consensus).
So statins were proscribed as “best medical practice.” About 15 years ago, my GP said “I can’t send you to a cardiologist who won’t prescribe statins.” Why not? *standard of practice.* Speaking about the U.S., if a doctor fails to follow standard of practice, they become quite vulnerable to malpractice suits if anything goes awry. Further, the prevalence of insurance removed, for many, issues of cost/benefit. We love the “free ride” that pharmaceutical companies pay for drug research. We distrust government, and for good cause, because government is run just as dysfunctionally as everything else.
Who is responsible for the situation? That’s a trick question, because “responsible” is not a defined state. However, the word has a meaning and purpose, and following that, we are responsible. If not, we might as well pack it in, because if someone else is responsible they are total screw-ups and they have all the power.
Dr. Kendrick, I and my colleagues face a similar situation with “cold fusion.” A consensus appeared in 1989-1990 that cemented in place a series of myths, that are trotted out whenever the topic comes up. Gary Taubes, ironically, was a major figure in creating that, with Bad Science, the short life and weird times of cold fusion. (I’ve been in communication with Taubes and he fully supports my efforts to facilitate genuine research, following the scientific method, which is what I would expect from him. When I have a killer paper — the kind of evidence that would completely bowl over skeptics in one fell swoop does not exist yet, though it might arise at any time — I’ll be in touch with him again. Meanwhile his work on nutritional science is just as important, if not more important.
It was suggested that you contact the media, allegedly they will print anything. Maybe, but generally they will print what they think their audience will read, that will attract eyeballs, which will please advertisers who pay the bills. They want something that Wikipedia calls “notable.” It must be news, not re-analysis. Such analysis belongs in reviews, published in peer-reviewed journals. The more reputable the journal the better, but the most reputable can be difficult nuts to crack. But any non-vanity journal could be the basis for a news story. Give them a good story, they will print it. I’ve seen a few already.
As you said you are, keep it up. Narrow the focus to a simple and clear message, as bulletproof as possible, if you can do that. What do we actually know? What is established from the available body of evidence, and what was previously concluded that was unwarranted or wrong?
Conspiracy theories are attractive, but are double-edged. Unless there is a smoking gun, don’t go there. It tends to discredit the theorist, even if he or she is right, if there is not very strong evidence.
Learning how to transform society can be a life-long study. I happen to think it worthwhile. If we take responsibility for results, we will gain power, and if we do this collectively, society will transform, whatever forces resist that will not prevail. Or if they respond in full force, they will have been made visible.
“If they are not shooting at you, you are not doing anything worth wasting bullets on.”
From personal experience, when you stop taking statins, the pain reduces, but does not go away immediately. I found that taking a pain killer (I took diclofenac, but that is frowned upon these days) let me walk further than otherwise, and I was able to gradually extend the distance (and height gain) and tail off the pain killers. Everything was OK after about 9 months, but I am not sure I would have had such a happy outcome without pushing my exercise the way I did.
Those who dissent will be called “baby killers”, “anti -stat” , “quacks”, “chartlatans”, “anti-science”. The world will be told that statins are “100% safe and effective” and that the ” science is settled”.
Dear Malcolm Kendrick
Reading this reminded me of the criticism there was, in an on-line comment to the Ethical Society prior to the meeting, of the title of your talk to us at Conway Hall on 22 November 1915: How Medical Research Died. I imagine you’d still think the title relevant if you were talking about the present medical situation.
I wish your blogs came as frequently as those I receive from the USA! Many thanks for what you write.
Kind regards
Fiona Weir
My goodness!, Dr K really doesn’t look that old on TV. must be tje lack of statins.
AhNotepad: I was going to say, “he’s well on his way to immortality.”
Headline in Daily Express sometime soon – Lady Di would still be alive had she taken Statins
As you cited:
“There is a flood of bad information on the internet and social media that is hurting human beings,” said Dr. Joseph Hill, the architect of the essay and editor-in-chief of the American Heart Association journal Circulation. “It’s not just an annoyance, this actually puts people in harm’s way.”
My take on getting alternativ information through our “still” free internet and social media is that the actual people getting harmed by us alternatively informed patients are the Big Pharma people.
I guess my 20 years of refusing all the heart drugs after my serious MI must have had some effect on their overall profits. I understand that they “hate” people like me or as the last cardiologist I met stated: “I consider it as almost criminal what you have been up to!” before he subscribed the standard kit of five pharmaceuticals he though knew I would never take.
Nine years now without stagnates, sorry statins. Such was “concern” my GP sent me to a cardiologist 2 yrs ago (in case my stent wud be clogged). Angiogram revealed nothing of concern. “Whatever your doing, keep on doing it” he announced.
And €250 for 20 min meeting.
Jerome, I guess the GP’s must get profoundly alarmed when encountering CVD patients who obviously cure themselves without any pharmaceuticals or GP assistance. If this behavior should turn into a norm their good livelihood (750 € is in my eyes corruption and actually an insult to ordinary people) will be gone.
750 € should be 750 €/hour
Jerome,
What did you exactly do apart from refusing the statins?
This would be interesting to know.
Funny – my first “reasonable” cardiologist also told me 15 years ago “Whatever you’r doing, keep on doing it” while my last one (?) a few years ago was just insulting me for what I was doing though he had nothing to comment on the results of all his blood testing.
I then also refused another angiography since I already knew from the first one that my arteries are severely blocked since 20 years and these guys sincerely just were waiting to “cut me up” although his US-examination told him that my heart looked and worked fine. There must be something wrong with a brain “program” of that kind to my opinion.
What is too often omitted is the role and development of collateral circulation. I was, two years ago, diagnosed with a cardiac blocked from a nuclear stress test, it appeared clearly under exercise. I refused statins and also put off having an angiogram. My cardiologist is quite a nice guy, I wouldn’t have one who wasn’t. He said that he understood why I would put it off, but that he would do it, himself, because “he knew too much.” Fine. I wanted to do the research, particularly on stents, so I could make an informed decision, there on the table in the hospital in the middle of the procedure. And I found that angiography and stents, in my condition (I’ve never had a heart attack), would not extend life, and they tended to fail, etc. So still, no procedure and no stent and no statins. I’ll be asking him lots of questions when I see him next! What I have found is that even if they are constrained to “standard of practice,” they will be honest if asked good questions, and knowing how to take them off the pedestal of All-Knowing Gods Responsible for Life, and respect them as humans having experience to share, working in a difficult system, has helped.
In any case, he said, that first consultation after the diagnosis, “I want to put you into cardiac rehab,” which is normally reserved for people who have had a heart attack, at least for insurance to pay for it.
Turns out they claim I do have angina, which was enough. I do experience some sensations of discomfort when exercising sometimes, and generally am happy to call it angina, only I carry nitroglycerin and the discomfort has never been enough to use it. And this is what I’ve noticed, from almost two years of an exercise program: my heart rate does not go up from exercise like it used to. There is a significant difference.
My guess is that my collateral circulation has improved, giving me the equivalent of a bypass with no operation.
If statins made it less likely for me to exercise, they would surely be a bad idea for me. I worry a bit, even, about the beta blocker I take, because it suppresses heart rate elevation so I speculate that it might slow down the development of collateral circulation. However, at this point, even when I forget to take the beta blocker, my heart rate doesn’t go up much. I am moving into more vigorous exercise, cardio, having focused on weight training until now, vigorous enough to previously elevate heart rate and feel like a workout. Time to go now!
One of the impressive, to me, results of reading this blog through has been a sense of appreciation for the body’s incredible mechanism for maintaining arteries. Different clotting mechanisms for a emergency rupture of a major artery, through tissue factor, and other clotting, amazing!
BTW today I found my self a very slow cross country skier compared with the performance of my wife and thus confirming my clogged artery state.
Well, well, we’ll see how long I keep going, still on 20 years of CVD “overtime”.
I am not sure that now sipping on an Ardbeg shot in front of my fireplace will remove any artery blockage but why not give it a try? 🙂
Goran
Low level exercise, with the intent of at least getting a little out of breath at least once a day and generating a little perspiration (eventually leading to 9 marathons,, given up due to depleted hip cartilage), cut down on all committee involvement, scaled down career ambitions and learned to relax with music, slow jogs, walking etc, cut down on alcohol.
Jérôme
My problem is getting puffed on the hills on my bike. However much training I do it doesnt get any better. Ideas’?
Jerome, it seems as stress reduction and exercise on a moderat level is the key to health not least to my own experience and keeping away from all medication where beta-blockers may be the main culprit.
Mr Chris
“My problem is getting puffed on the hills on my bike. ”
I for sure had that problem myself, humiliating when all elderly people easily passed me and with my wife waiting for me at the top of the hills. Then I probably made the best investment in my life (?) and bought me a good quality electric bike. Easy to adjust the support level you think you need. (Now it is vice versa but my wife wonders if she should buy herself a similar one.)
What a relief! I got my “self-respect” back.
Cheating? 🙂
Mr Chris
Couldn’t possibly comment as hill gradient, speed, duration of cycle, any underlying conditions, age etc are unknowns
Jérôme
All of what you say is true, but I was not looking for á detailled training program. My comment was on the notion that by small increments one can improve. I think however there comes a time and age where just keeping at the same level for is quite good.
“I am not sure that now sipping on an Ardbeg shot in front of my fireplace will remove any artery blockage but why not give it a try? ”
The best kind of Healthy Whole Grains
The Lancet article sent my statin support group into a frenzy. Thank you for the timely explanation that the article is just more of the same… take statins to live longer as if those 75 and over don’t already have a few aches and pains! I share many of your articles. Knowledge is power(ful).
I always get two things from your posts….valuable information and a good laugh! Both good for overall health. Keep it up!
Blunt & excellent
Thanks
Not releasing the data from which you draw your advice from a meta analysis is like publishing an RCT, keeeping the results back, and then expecting people to follow your recommendations from your conclusions.
My standard answer as a GP if an over 75 year old asks about statins is that the intention behind giving statins (never mind if true or not) to patients is to stop them from dying young, and this clearly hasn’t happened (in your case) so you don’t need to take them. Not even statin makers yet claim that they will make you live forever!
I have a different answer for dissuading the under 75s.
In my humble opinion:
Statins are just one type of drug. If the public does get wise to them the pharmaceuticals will come up with some other ridiculous panacea. What the public really needs to know is that cholesterol is good. It needs to know that the medical profession and drug companies are ill.
“Yes, the US founding fathers knew the first thing tyrannies always wish to do is remove freedom of speech. From that, all else follows. If they don’t get that message, they should all be forced to read 1984 by George Orwell.”
Exactly. It’s also what they don’t allow into the public domain. I expect it is the same for the medical industrial complex but my experience has been more on the political-media front. In the Salisbury poisoning “On March 5 [2018] the Clinical Services Journal (CSJ) reported “a major incident after two patients were exposed to what was believed to be an opiate . . . an incident . . . in which a man and a woman were exposed to the drug Fentanyl in the city centre.” This was changed to fit the reported narrative. The problem is ubiquitous and not a reporter in the western world is allowed to report it. You might well mention Orwell’s 1984.
https://johnplatinumgoss.wordpress.com/2019/01/28/pablo-miller-spyline/
I think the verity of the original CSJ report can be endorsed by the consultant in emergency medicine Stephen Davies at Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust, who had to write a letter to the Times to allay fears that there was some kind major event of nerve agent poisoning in the city. He wrote “Sir, Further to your report (“Poison exposure leaves 40 needing treatment”. Mar. 14), may I clarify that no patients have experienced symptoms of nerve agent poisoning and there have only ever been three patients with significant poisoning . . . Any blood tests performed have shown no abnormality. No member of the public has been contaminated by the agent involved.”
Oh Dr Kendrick, How I look forward to your incisive comments on the whole issue of cholesterol and Statins. I came across this article in the comment section, when I was arguing against the random and an unnecessary prescription of Statins to the over 75’s in a newspaper’s discussion.
What do you think of this as a cause of heart disease?
If it’s as deadly as high cholestoral, then it can’t be too bad !
my thoughts exactly!
I think this research is interesting. Mutated white blood stem cells could be the source of the white blood cells in arterial plaque.
So far though this is just correlation not proved causation. So more research is indeed needed. But clearly cholesterol has little to do with it.
I have now read the article and it definitely makes for interesting reading. This could even be the missing link we have been looking for, except that with the mechism outlines, we’d have to be looking for something that caused increased stem cell mutation rates in the 1920 to 50s that caused the peak in CVD in the 1960s to 1980s. If true, we’d have to be looking for multiple sources because corn oil, lead in gasoline or atomic bomb testing each of its own don’t hit the right time frame.
What I don’t like is the fatalistic summary, that there is no known treatment so there is no benefit to testing. I would hazard that even if the white blood cells are mutated, they will start nesting in plaques only if one other factor is present, such as high insulin.
Eric: In “The Salt Fix,” Dr. DiNicolantonio makes the supposition that sugar, not salt, is the culprit for high BP, and that the rise in CVD in the 20th Century parallels the increase in sugar consumption. That is, increased sugar consumption increases the risk of diabetes, and diabetes increases the risk of CVD.
Sure, but why did CVD start to decrease long before sugar consumption went down? Actually, sugar consumption has only gone down very recently in the UK and NL that have introduced a sugar tax but almost nowhere else.
Indeed.
Eric: Good point. I’ve just read Chapter 6 of “The Great Cholesterol Con,” in which Dr. Kendrick writes at some length about the unreliability of CVD statistics prior to at least 1948.
Indeed second factor such as insulin or indeed CVD started going down long before sugar consumption or indeed on both counts?
from Eric: “looking for something that caused increased stem cell mutation rates in the 1920 to 50s that caused the peak in CVD in the 1960s to 1980s. If true, we’d have to be looking for multiple sources because corn oil, lead in gasoline or atomic bomb testing each of its own don’t hit the right time frame.”
The atmospheric tests of atom bombs, wasn’t that in mid-1940s? Somewhere there’s a USGS map showing the ground level gamma rays all over the US in the 1990s, virtually confirming the distribution pattern as being roughly a diagonal SW-NE smear across the country. Most of the food we grow is in the Midwest, and so are most of the cows.
Another factor could be general nutrition level. Dr. Bruce Ames did some very careful studies of vitamin deficiency in the US and found that most of the mutations were directly because of nutrition deficiency, despite the US being a well fed nation. He’s still advising students on how to carry on his work, and I had heard he published something new recently. The connection to the time frame would be the Dust Bowl era. The crop failure was fixed by using chemical fertilizers, but the nutrition never got back into the food until Organic farming started being more widely used. It’s still a luxury to buy organic though.
I don’t agree with him on everything, but his observations about how nutritional deficiency causes mutation is spot on: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bruce-Ames
I think the high yield, hydrogen bomb tests in the atmosphere were mainly in the late 1950’s to the early 1960’s. I can certainly remember hearing about them on the news as a child, and I used to wear a CND badge on my school uniform. The school policy was: ” If you could argue the case, you could wear the badge.”
The atmospheric tests were conducted by the USA mainly on Bikini and other atolls in the South Pacific, by the UK both on the Australian mainland and on islands such as Christmas Island in the South Pacific, and by the Soviet Union mainly on the island of Novaya Zemlya in the Arctic Ocean. These tests were banned by the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty signed by the USA, the UK and the Soviet Union on 5th August 1963.
Subsequently, several USA and Soviet Union underground tests went wrong, accidentally venting radio-active fall-out into the atmosphere.
“A fact that needs to be emphasised is that the CTT will not let anyone else see the data they hold. Including all the data on adverse events [side-effects] and serious adverse events. It is kept completely secret.”
This is a non negotiable feature of science, that if an experiment can’t be reproduced, then it isn’t valid. Holding the data back from colleagues should be a red flag.
So what happened with Judy Milovits then? Her refusal to share her data also stuck with me as something odd. Surely the patients at the clinic knew they were receiving experimental treatment. She must’ve known that she was doing research and that others would need to verify it. Did she expect others to come up with a whole new population of ME/CFS patients?
In a similar way, does the CTT expect that another “cohort” of patients will be used to verify their results? Or refute them? If so, then we should get to work showing that statins are dangerous in nursing homes all over each country. After all they’re making claims that are targeted right at our elders who often have little choice in their place and manner of living.
I hope nobody missed the vulnerable population involved here. Maybe they just took a risky step, because I’d be willing to bet that statins either make elderly people in nursing homes worse, or they have no effect. Either way, it’s a death knell for statins there. Who would fund a study to evaluate the effect of statins on the elderly (without pharmaco money of course)? Surely the pharmaco’s are confident of their product? At least enough to not make a fuss?
Thank you once again for your publications. I am in the US and I read this new information about the over 75 over the weekend. It caused me a great deal of stress. I had a SAE 5 yrs ago and only took statins for less than a year. I often question whether or not I have made the right decision and there your article is to reassure my decision. I have very little trust in the medical community for a litnay of good reasons with you being one of the few exceptions. They should do a study on the effects of withholding seriously pertinent information from heart patients so that they may make an informed decision. It is unconscionable! Thank you for all you do.
Thank you Malcolm, as always deeply indebted to you for your erudite words.
I’ve also just finished your latest book ‘A Statin Nation’ – excellent and highly recommended to anybody out there who has not yet purchased.
If the Australian journalist you are referring to has initials of M D, that email exchange was fairly widespread on the interwebs. Has Colin Baigent spat the dummy and threatened legal action against all and sundry?
NNT (number-needed-to-treat) can be useful for many drugs. https://www.thennt.com/
Malcolm … how do we love thee? let us count the ways … go get ’em !
Completely unrelated to this blog entry but vaccination is often enough discussed here, about the psychology of antivax:
https://slate.com/technology/2019/02/antivax-measles-outbreak-moral-foundations-theory.html
Somewhat related do vax:
I just heard a Prof. Baumann from the cancer institute of Heidelberg university, who was visiting a cancer congress and was interviewed. He said that a considerable number of cancers were driven by inflammation, and finding better ways to reduce inflammation would prevent cancer. This is somewhat contrary to Malcolm’s view that inflammation is generally a good thing. However, the examples here brought were better vaccination against some bacteria (?!) and viruses.
Eric,
The Slate article you posted is part of the problem. Vaccines are a nightmare, as some people die from them while others are permanently disabled or live with chronic health problems. They cause far more harm than good. Suzanne Humphries wrote a fantastic book about it:
The propaganda campaign around vaccines is the same as with statins.
J.B. Handley is another great resource. He was a hedge fund manager, and started researching vaccines after his son became autistic from vaccine damage:
Anyone with a “proper mind” must be convinced about the hypocrisy of Big Pharma and our medical establishment relating to vaccination having read Humphries book. Anyway I myself lost most of what I earlier believed.
I take issue with this statement: “and started researching vaccines after his son became autistic from vaccine damage” If this is his unquestioning premise, the whole book can only be flawed.
Eric, that is hardly a scientific appraisal of the statement.
Actually, it is. It makes it sound that he started with the premise that vaccination caused his son’s autism. I wonder how he proved that!
Eric: The Vaccine Injury Compensation Program in the U.S. has compensated at least 83 cases of vaccine-induced autism. This is public knowledge, though not widely known. By the end of the ’90’s there had been over new 5000 claims filed, and they panicked, for were even a portion of those compensated, it would have bankrupted the system. They consolidated the cases into what they called the Omnibus Autism Proceedings, then chose four “test cases” to decide them all. Hannah Poling was one of those test cases. They quietly settled her case, thus removing her from the proceedings (these settlements are confidential; we only know about it because of a leak). They then ultimately dismissed them all, the DOJ attorneys lying about Dr. Zimmerman’s changed views. Details in JB Handley’s new book. Fact is, there is no oversight of vaccines by those whose duty is to protect us. The public health system is a marketing tool for industry.
What I’d like to know is what ELSE causes autism. Autistic Spectrum disorders are yet another thing that appears to have increased in lock-step with all the other metabolic diseases that were rare or unknown prior to high carb low fat diets.
chris c, Stephanie Seneff’s research into glyphosate indicates a connection with autism. https://youtu.be/g3I3b3WpCwU. However, the presenter is out of his depth.
chris c: The most important question. Nobody really knows, and the NIH refuses to fund research which in any way might threaten vaccine policy. But it is clear the etiology of autism (ASD is the same thing, just different terminology). begins with chronic microglial activation in the brain. A brain injury. The most vulnerable time is conception to age three, as the brain is rapidly developing during this period. And Dr. Andrew Zimmerman, the nation’s leading autism expert explains the biological pathway through which this happens. There is no longer any question that vaccines cause autism. Both Dr. Julie Gerberding, former CDC head, and Dr. Frank DeStefano, current head of CDC’s immunization division, admitted this of national TV. There are very likely other insults to the developing fetus and young child which lead to the type of brain injury which results in autism, and their must be, as the rate is rising exponentially for a condition which was never described in the medical literature until the 1940’s. Only independent research can answer the question of what they are, but there is little money available for it. I suspect glyphosate plays a role, as it disrupts the gut micro-biome, and the gut and the brain are intimately connected and in constant communication. It is the same dog and pony show which has brought us statins. With drugs, though, manufacturers must put them through three stages of randomized controlled trials, and show both safety and benefit. With biologicals (as vaccines are classed), there are no RCT’s. That’s right. No U.S.-licensed vaccine has ever been safety tested using placebo (with two very minor exceptions). They use either another vaccine, the adjuvant only, or no control group at all. It is a complete can of worms. And post-marketing surveillance with vaccines is a cruel joke.
That they settled a few cases is hardly scientific or legal proof of anything.
Eric, that may be true, but this is worth bearing in mind https://youtu.be/jt9rdznYsLI
Eric: Also bear in mind that only about 1% of vaccine adverse events are reported, and only about 1/3 of claimants are successful. Doctors are not trained in recognizing them and are discouraged from doing so, and many don’t even know that VAERS and the compensation system even exist. Their trade union, the American Academy of Pediatrics, functions as a branch of the CDC, which is basically a tax-payer-funded vaccine company. Autism is a terrible crisis the world over, and vaccines are the main driver. If you want science, Ginger Taylor has compiled a list of 151 published papers which link vaccines to autism. Another good source is vaccinepapers.org.
It interests me because I am somewhat “on the spectrum” as you may have noticed.
My late mother claimed that I was “full of energy” when I was young, and early photos show I appeared to have been developing normally, until I started school and was hit by mumps and chickenpox back to back, shortly followed by measles. Coincidence? I don’t know but it was then that I started having symptoms of diabetes, and conditions that are “common in diabetics”. I stopped developing normally either physically or mentally. Well the diabetes runs mostly in males in one specific line of my family, it may just be coincidence that it started to develop at that time. Cause and effect become entwined. I think the Aspergers/high functioning autism started at the same time too.
Glyphosate hadn’t been invented then, and the equivalent of the MMR was mothers holding “measles parties” to get the childhood infections over and done with early. Obviously MOST people weren’t affected. I think the only vaccinations I had were polio, diptheria and smallpox. Maybe tetanus, I don’t remember. Nothing like kids get today anyway. I was found to be immune to TB without actually ever having had it so didn’t need the BCG.
Going back further, my mother developed Crohn’s, my father Graves and one of his brothers Type 1 diabetes, all autoimmune and all while living in the same village. If that all happened at the same time there might have been an environmental factor – a friend is one of seven children who all developed Type 1 at the same time in the same town, IMO unlikely to be a coincidence.
Hi Chris I am the mother of a child with type 1 diabetes from age 8, a child with type 2 diabetes from his father’s side in his 30’s, a mum with hypothyroid, coeliac& REM Sleep disorder (no 24 hour rhythm), a dad who had coeliac but gluten sensitivity type, and I have 2 coeliac genes, affecying both gut and brain, gluten sensitivity & ataxia. What is common to much autoimmune I have discovered is anti gad anti bodies. Additionally, all 3 of my son’s have AS in differing amounts, despite there being 2 differen fathers, but my sons excellent Doctor many years ago, gave opinion that this was because I was also that way inclined! Hoevet, i
t has been beneficial as it gave me the obsessivenss and passion to investigate first T1DM, which years ago often occurred especially in boys in the spring following cocksackie infection’s in the autumn/winter. Enterovirus infections are also implicated. Autistic spectrum also frequently has gut involvement in children, beit constipation or diarrhoea issues. The more you look into these things, the more there seem to be links.
Interestingly, my eldest, who is now 47, had chickenpox and mumps concurrently when he was three; he was not very ill at all, but 13 years later he had a nasty case of shingles.
My understanding is we need repeated exposure to a disease to reduce the chances of the body reacting to it. Then there’s the nutrition factor too. Apparently GPs who deal with children are significantly to suffer chicken pox or shingles than GPs who don’t deal with children.
I had mumps but not chicken pox as a child. I caught chicken pox at the age of 25. A group on a tour bus I was on had shingles. I probably got it from them.
I can tell you that having visible pustules all over your body plays hell with your social life. Better to get it over with as a child (or get vaccinated, if so inclined). ;o)
Yes the interconnectedness is interesting and one of my obsessions. Different genes may shunt the same environmental insult down different pathways, or different insults down the same pathway. I knew a mother and daughter with a particular HLA antigen – she developed adult-onset Type 1 and her daughter rheumatoid arthritis both at the same time, seemingly following a bout of flu. Later the daughter developed Hashimotos and I think the mother developed lupus at the same time. There are families like that where everyone has at least one and often more than one autoimmune disease. I suspect a highly effective immune system was a benefit in an environment with a lot of infectious agents but much less so in the comparatively sterile modern world.
Another weirdness – one side of my family had NO cancer at all, and the other side hardly any. Statistics-based medicine says I must be lying but it did actually happen.
We didn’t have glyphosate or any organophosphates back in my day but we did have organochlorines. I used to help my father in the garden and allotment and though I never actually applied the DDT or Gamma BHC I probably came into contact with them, and the agricultural sprays when we walked on the farmland. I just remembered something else – the council used to spray the footpaths and road edges with weedkiller which smelled like a mixture of coal tar and raw sewage – the whole area would reek for days. God knows what it was. That probably didn’t do any good either.
Add in all the smoke from the coal fires, and the smell of cleaning products in some people’s houses and it’s a wonder anyone survived unscathed.
If Bauman thinks that injecting vaccines, which almost certainly contain toxic substances, is a way to cure anything, he needs to understand nutrution, becasue he apparently doesn’t yet.
Hang on, regardless of the truth about vaccines, that is no sort of argument. Everything is toxic in excess – ingest 6-7 litres of water and you may die because of dilution of the blood.
Talking about toxins makes no sense without quantifying what you are talking about.
David Bailey, that also is not much of an arguement. You should know most vaccines contain an aluminium salt to hyper-stimulate the immune system. Aluminium is a neuro toxin, and sufficient to require a bodyweight of over 500lb to be below the WHO recommended maximum dose. Many vaccines contain thimerosol, a mercury compound. Mercury in any dose is toxic. Then there is formaldehyde, polysorbate 80, squalene, etc.
Just to list those for Fluad, Squalene, polysorbate 80, sorbitan trioleate, sodium citrate dehydrate, citric acid monohydrate, neomycin, kanamycin, barium, egg proteins, CTAB(cetyltrimethylammonium bromide), formaldehyde.
Not a nice concoction in my opinion.
You say everything is toxic at some dose, since there are several vitamins which have never been recorded as causing a death in the US, even from their coast to coast monitiring services, it seems possible that some things either are not, or cannot be toxic because of the way they are handled in the body.
AhNotepad,
If water is toxic in sufficient quantities, so is everything else. You can’t talk of toxicity without thinking about the dose. You have no doubt smelled formaldehyde – I know I have – and that means we got some molecules of entered our bodies. I certainly have silver amalgam fillings in some teeth, and I am not planning on getting them replaced, despite the traces of mercury that will leak into my system. You find aluminium in many deodorants, etc etc.
You may or may not be right about the dangers of vaccines, but if they are toxic, it is because of the dose.
David Bailey, I agree, but the toxicity of vaccines is inevitable in the case of aluminium alone. The amount in a dose would require a bodyweight of over 500lb if it was to be below the WHO figure for a safe limit. That is just one chemical, and that is used to deliberately hyperstimulate the immmune system which otherwise would not react sufficiently to produce antibodies to the pathogens. The problem is compounded because it is injected and so bypasses all natural possible protective mechanisms. Never mind whether antibodies are actually needed anyway.
Next is the foreign proteins and DNA. Proteins going into the gut are dealt dealt with. Proteins injected into muscles and blood vessels are not. Some of those cells are “immortal” cell lines, also known as cancer if I understand correctly.
I have a belief that no vaccine will do me any good whatever, but proper nutrition will give me all the protection I need, provided I don’t indulge in too much abuse such as exposure to chemicals.
No flu shots for me thanks. Especially given they are statistically ineffective for the over 65s.
AH Notepad
about flu vaccine effectiveness in over 65’s, here is a paper which suggests a 58% effectiveness.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4718343/
I get the jab each year, don’t get flu anymore, could be placebo, could be other things. over 50% seems good to me
Mr Chris: Read Peter Doshi’s two papers in BMJ concerning influenza. On average only one in six cases of flu-like illness are lab-confirmed to be associated with influenza virus. Thus, the highest possible efficacy, on average, is 15%. The vaccine itself is dangerous, responsible now for the majority of cases compensated in our injury compensation system. Get it if you wish, but I consider it a complete scam.
Hi, Mr Chris – I’m not at all surprised you you don’t get flu, jabbed or not. I’m 76 now and have had influenza only twice in my life. Quite a lot of heavy colds in all that time but flu only twice. Maybe I’ve just been lucky.
Mr Chris, in the interests of balance, I don’t get the jab, and don’t get flu. Most people don’t get flu, in fact, most people don’t get most diseases. Stephanie Seneff has said somewhere in a video (which I can’t find) that flu is allowed in when we have a blood sulphate deficiency, and the virus liberates sulphate from the muscles to correct it. Another suggestion of her’s is that cholesterol builds up in arteries waiting for sulphates to allow it to get into the heart muscle.
https://youtu.be/g3I3b3WpCwU. It’s long, and the presenter is way out of his depth.
Ah notepad
Thanks for that. I suppose the devil is in the dosage. One jab once a year, no aluminium in the adjuvants, and could be doing me some good. I am prepared to take the risk on that. On the other hand don’t try to convince to take any of the cardiac cocktail for the rest of my puff!!
Mr Chris, maybe not aluminium, they use squalene instead. Squalene is a natural substance in your body, but there are problems in the pipeline if it is injected to be used as an adjuvant. https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/08/04/squalene-the-swine-flu-vaccines-dirty-little-secret-exposed.aspx
Acute inflammation is good as it heals. Cronic inflammation is the problem .
Leon, thank you for this. It seems to be a source of constant confusion. Chronic inflammation is bad simply because it means the body is attempting to repair something but cannot. So there is ongoing irritation.
“Two plus two does equal four. Always bear that fact in mind.”
Unless you happen to be Pippi Longstocking!
The periodic table(chart) is what I use for navigation on this journey. Statins are manufactured with “active and inactive” ingredients. These two terms have nothing to do with chemistry, they are legal terms defined in human law. The inactive ingredient list, available online, includes coal tar dyes and other active chemicals. 1n1s1!
Where is the money that keeps CTT going coming from these days? With all statins off patent, what is the point of pitching statins for big pharma now?
One should think that they’d be badmouthing statins and praising a new class of drugs by now, such as PSK-9-inhibitors. Wait, they failed spectacularly? Nah, we just have to give the studies the right spin.
I suspect the protocol is that since statins are now off patent and thus less profitable we need to market more of them to more people. Kerching! but a smaller one.
I also assumed with the onset of PCSK9s they would throw statins under the bus. Maybe they will, just not yet.
Reblogged this on Taking Sides.
Dr. Kendrick. I have an honest and serious question that I do not believe I have seen you address in your commentary. Is there EVER an appropriate situation that calls for the use of a statin? Or are they uniformly and always a bad thing?
Your asking me a direct question that I have a tendency to answer in an oblique fashion – for various reasons.
Commenting101,
Remember that Dr K is a doctor, and wants to remain one, I presume. He clearly has to tread an extraordinarily fine line in what he writes, just look at the trouble Tim Noakes got into!
I have read a fair amount on this subject, and I’d certainly not take a statin again ever, under any circumstances. I wouldn’t take a PCSK9 inhibitor either, because I think there is evidence that very low cholesterol is actually harmful – indeed, it must be, because it is used to construct all sorts of things in the body! If someone tells you that lower levels of X are always beneficial, and yet you know that X is required inside the body, you can only come to one conclusion!
Of course, I am not a medical doctor!
101, anyone who has done his proper homework on the cellular biology and physiology involved with the cholesterol and the satins should clearly realize what an immense offensive scam we are all exposed to through the greed of Big Pharma.
Medical science is constantly been dragged into the deepest dirt pools ever created by these guys.
Thank you for your input David And Goren. I occasionally see people touting the anti-inflammatory properties of statins as being useful for people with existing cardiovascular disease.
101, I seem to recall that Dr Kendrick has written that inflammation is good; dampening it down so that it can’t function properly is counterproductive.
Reblogged this on Babble On… and commented:
More pharma corruption… to the detriment of innocent seniors and others who have been conned into taking a drug that provides questionable benefit.
Fred Goodwin (Fred the shred) was stripped of his knighthood. . . . . Professor (Sir) Rory Collins deserves the same.
Statins are a mitochondrial toxin. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3365271/
Some of this goes against the arguments in these papers.
This extract stands out;
“statins increased ROS production differently in heart and skeletal muscle and could be represent as a double-edged sword: they are beneficial by playing an important role in cell signalling involved in antioxidant defence network in cardiac muscle, but could be harmful by inducing excessive oxidative stress in vulnerable skeletal muscle.”
Let the debate begin !
Marvelous post, Dr. Kendrick! Here’s your confrere backing you up on statins, incl. the shocking statistical prevarications, attenuated very slightly by the statin mfgr’s lawyer’s “1% absolute risk” in blue font on a blue background in the ad.
David Diamond at Low Carb Houston, 2018
David is a good man, and very bright.
Thanks for the link to David Diamond. Absolutely brilliant! To repeat it, because this video is so clear: https://youtu.be/psnkNqLA4Os
What responses are there from the “mainstream”?
I will be seeing my cardiologist in not long, and I plan to ask him to ‘splain this thing to me. Two years ago, he highly recommended statins, said there is better evidence now, etc. I was skeptical but am an actual skeptic: I don’t forget to be skeptical of my own ideas. I don’t expect him to take his clinical time to explain, but rather to point me to the papers, and why he concluded that this is worth recommending, in spite of the risks of damaging side-effects. I’m taking a beta blocker, to keep my heart rate low when I exercise, diagnosed with CVD because of a showing of blockage in a nuclear stress test. I take it to keep him happy.
I didn’t go for an angiogram, in spite of his recommendation, because the research I found showed no survival benefit for people like me, never had a heart attack.
I want to continue to build collateral circulation. (It does seem to be working. From the same exercise, actually increased, my heart rate does not go up much even when I forget to take the blocker.) My worry about the beta blocker — I don’t seem to notice any side effects — is that lower heart rate might be reducing the formation rate for collateral circulation, so I will be asking him about that.
Is there any evidence on this?
Sorry, don’t know. I have never seen anything up to now.
I love doctors who say they don’t know.
Now, from what I read here, I’m looking at the baby aspirin I take every day. Same bloody story, pun intended. No benefit in life expectancy.
I started years ago because an old friend was married to a cardiologist and he recommended it as definitely beneficial. Very smart guy and he believed it. No big pharma behind it.
But I haven’t had a heart attack and I’m 74. The only major event I have experienced was transient deep venous thrombosis once from flying long distance, leading to multiple pulmonary emboli.
I have some level of risk because of that diagnosed blockage. So, should I stop? What I’m finding is disagreement, and about everybody says “ask your doctor because of possible rebound effect.” What, ask God? Hey, great idea!
Then a study that rebound effect doesn’t happen with low-dose aspirin. But I could start cutting them in half, or I could take them every other day, taper off.
Maybe I will ask God by tossing a coin. Nah. I’ve gotten as far as I have by trusting my intuition, which is not about “knowing” but about “doing,” trusting reality, more than all these ideas that pass for Truth.
Isn’t there a pill I can take that will guarantee happiness forever? Or a doctor who is Always Right? Where is the Journal of Clear and Proven Medicine, No Joke?
abdlomax, I have no evidence, but I have a case history. I don’t have a cardiologist. I did have a heart rate of 120 when resting, so I talked to my GP who prescribed a beta blocker. That slowed my heart rate, but I was unhappy about having to take a pill for eternity. So I stopped it now and again until my heart rate rose, when I took a few more days of beta blocker. No problem with blood pressure. Coincedentally I stopped eating wheat, and I thought I might as well stop most other major carb groups too.
Where was I going to get the energy. Fats, so I discovered. Up went the butter, eggs, cream, and cheese. Everything was fine. (As far as I could tell). Cut out beta blockers, heart rate about 70. One great benefit was I stopped feeling hungry every few hours.
Plenty of vitamin C, occasional D, dark chocolate.
abdlomax,
Check this out for collaterals:
Enhanced External Counterpulsation.
abdlomax: Important question, but I cannot provide any insight. The beta blocker (atenolol) was the first (of three) BP drugs I quit, because it caused positional hypotension. When I got up from squatting in the garden, I’d nearly faint.
ABLOMAX
Why not try some garlic instead of the baby aspirin? It is BTW quite “natural”! I have been doing that myself for 20 years now.
Good Aspirin Article:
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/questioning-the-safety-and-effectiveness-of-daily-aspirin-use/
Gary.
I agree with you about Atenolol. Ghastly drug, I was like a zombie on it. But I have had no noticeable side-effects from Bisoprolol, which I have now been taking for over five years. I guess this is just an individual thing, and one just has to try and judge from experience which medications, foods, dietary supplements and other things, make one’s individual self feel one’s best at any particular point in one’s life.
As I approach my 70th birthday in the summer, I feel I am doing OK. When I reach that milestone, I then hope that me and my husband will both be here and in good enough health to celebrate our golden wedding in 2020. Then I hope to see all five of our grandchildren reach adulthood. After that, I have no particular goals: just to depart without too much pain and fuss, to leave the world uncluttered for the later generations.
I once read that most of the increase in the world’s population over the next few decades will be us old people living longer. Too many of us, if we are unable to live independently, will be an insufferable burden both on those, whom we love most, and the rest of our fellow citizens.
shirley3349: That’s why I keep myself in good shape. There is no need to fall to pieces before old age gets us. My grampa lived to 87 (1884-1972), and my mother to 97; neither were much of a burden until near the end.
Dr.Zoe Harcombe is scathing of the report.
http://www.zoeharcombe.com/2019/02/statins-in-the-over-75s/
“The CTT personnel even re-calculated the Rate Ratios after leaving out four trials where “statin therapy had not been shown to be effective.” Yes – really – ponder on that for a second. Even leaving out four trials that didn’t show support for statins, they still could not achieve a statistically significant result in the over 75 age group.
All the reports in the media that “up to 8,000 lives a year could be saved”, with reference to over 75s (or over 70s without the fudge) are false.”
Statins are considered to have some benefit when used in secondary prevention.
I think I read Dr M saying that the little blue pill has a better effect.
On this tack I have recently been reading much about the peptide Ghrelin as its 20th Birthday is this year. It appears that IV perfusions are highly beneficial in those who have suffered an MI.
Presumably this won’t be adopted though as it cannot be patented.
As an aside, ghrelin is what causes the ‘munchies’ in Cannabis sativa use, as Cannabis sativa stimulates production of ghrelin by the mucosa of the stomach and upper (small) intestine. Ghrelin also suppresses the ‘sympathetic’ response, hence raising the ‘parasympathetic’ another benefit after an MI and another ‘effect’ of Cannabis sativa.
Stephen Rhodes: Thanks. Fascinating information, though I’m not about to take it up again after a 40-year hiatus, even though it is legal here.
I used to toke a bit back in the day. Mostly quality stuff imported by enthusiastic amateurs – Pakistani Black, Nepalese Temple Balls, Thai Sticks etc. Then it all became Moroccan of varying but usually low quality, then Skunk took over which was like a completely different drug and IMO not a very nice one. A case of Big Criminals taking over.
I did have a smoke a year or two back – some grew in my garden, presumably from birdseed, and I didn’t want to waste it, It was very mild but worked, which surprised me as they have put a lot of work into making non-psychoactive versions. Several local farmers grew it for the fibre industry but the factory went bust. Long ago it was a local crop, maybe why there are so many mellow old folks around.
Daily Aspirin May Not Save Lives (because aspirin causes strokes) re: 13 studies on nearly 165,000 adults http://www.drmirkin.com/heart/will-daily-baby-aspirin-help-to-prevent-a-heart-attack.html
Dr. Kendrick: Teleoanalysis. What a hoot! P.T. Barnum may not have been overly impressed, but would have approved.
I have just seen this weeks online Lancet and was disappointed, although not surprised, not to see your reply to their article supporting increasing statin profits by extending the offer to over 75’s Dr Kendrick. Is one able to comment on this on the Lancet comments if one isnt a medic?
Sasha: Off topic, but not really. One final comment about electric vehicles. We’ve had extreme, record cold in the Midwest. EV’s used stored battery power for space heating, so this will drain the batteries faster; the battery pack cannot be recharged at temperatures below the freezing point of water. This could be a deadly problem in a cold climate, but then it would reduce the CVD death rate slightly. I really have no position on EV’s, but don’t like the subsidy.
Gary, I agree that there are important technological bottlenecks with EVs. I do think that eventually they will be solved.
Sasha: This, though is a fatal flaw for cold climate applications. California has just mandated that all buses sold beginning in 2030 be electric. This is problematic here, in hilly terrain, and because of reduced range. What will Greyhound do? In Minnesota it would not work.
Sasha: This is a fatal flaw, though, in cold climate applications. California has just mandated that all buses sold in 2030 and beyond be electric. This is problematic here, in hilly terrain, and because of limited range. In Minnesota it would never work. What will Greyhound do? Disgorge passengers and luggage in the middle of an LA traffic jam, and put them on a new bus which may take days to get there? What about school buses? The crumbgobblers would surely enjoy the adventure, the driver not so much. Seems to me we’re putting the cart before the horse.
Gary: I’ve heard about issues with EVs and cold weather but I can’t comment on it further because that’s all I know at this point. I would have to read up on it to respond to your criticism. However, I do know that Moscow has started introducing e-buses and Moscow gets pretty cold. There are also e-buses in Finland which gets even colder. How are they doing it? I’m not sure. China, by the way, has more than 200 thousand e-buses by now.
What I find very curious about this discussion is that many people on this blog have no difficulty believing that established corporate interests like Pharma and Big Food will protect their financial interests. But when it comes to the issue of climate and pollution this thinking is suddenly reversed and it all becomes a big leftist plot with fossil fuel and car companies as innocent bystanders suffering at the hands of deranged Left who wants to impose “vast taxes” and control our lives.
In my opinion, this issue goes beyond left and right and it affects us all. The good news (at least to my thinking) is that China has taken a lead on these technologies. As you probably know, China and India plan to ban all new sales of ICEs by 2030. If that happens, it will probably mean the end of internal combustion engine.
Sasha: Very interesting that Russia is experimenting with these, too. I was wondering about that. Any student of history well knows how cold it can get in Moscow. My only real beef is about mandates. These have a tendency to warp the normal evolution of technological progress. I have no political objection to electric vehicles; nevertheless, politicians rarely know enough about much of anything to formulate policy, so they turn to unelected, unaccountable “experts,” thus Obamacare, which while helping many, was an enormous gift to the medical industry, and put together by a Congressional staffer. Nobody except him had any idea what was in it before they voted on it.
Gary, I think that if we look at the history of many technological innovations, we will find that they were subsidized in one form or another.
Sasha: Subsidized, yes. This is often a good thing. Mileage standards, too, have been a real positive, as have pollution controls. Mandating a particular behavior, though, is a different matter; I find it unsettling. I think the customer should be the one to make the choice. If people want electric cars, they will buy them; so far, few do.
I think the reason China and India will be requiring them is that otherwise they will choke to death.
Sasha: Good point, although As far as I know, in the main it is coal burning in both countries which is choking them to death. I’ve been thinking about Russia. With such very large petroleum reserves, what would be their motivation to convert to electricity for auto transport? What about their grid? Getting a bit vulnerable here. Electric vehicles in cities may work reasonably well, but what about a road trip to Siberia? I say this because my main use for transportation is driving to the wilds each week. An EV would be out of the question. They don’t come in 4-wheel drive, as far as I know, and there are no charging stations. So, about a year ago I bought a new infernal-combustion-powered pickup to replace my 19-year-old one just for this purpose. Anyway, a road trip is a wonderful adventure
Gary: to be honest I was as surprised to see Moscow beginning to implement e-buses. I have no idea what their reasons are. By the same token, we could ask why would Norway (both cold and with huge oil reserves) be getting ready to ban all new ICE sales by 2025?
Sasha: It’s hard not to see the man behind the curtain here. Much easier to control the movement of the population when they are dependent on plugging the vehicle in and waiting hours. The production and distribution of power is much more centralized, too, than that of petroleum fuels. It requires fuel to produce that power (no solar at night; wind even less useful), and a great deal is lost in transmission. Makes me wonder if hybrids can make sense. Yesterday I saw a full-size SUV-a GM Yukon-with a “Hybrid” label.
Gary, don’t you think there may come a time when batteries become powerful and affordable enough for people to generate and store their own power?
I think those technological problems may be more difficult than you think – particularly at a time when there are terrorists that want to find good ways to cause an explosion. The problem is that the fuel for an ordinary car requires oxygen to release energy – so usually even a catastrophic failure doesn’t release all the energy in a tank of petrol in a few milliseconds. However, a battery can and sometimes does release its energy in a catastrophically rapid way. Mobile phone batteries have exploded, and they only use tiny batteries. Optimising EV batteries for maximum capacity, seems very likely to cause nasty problems.
There is also the little matter of actually generating the electricity in the first place! Note that a considerable amount of that power will be wasted by distributing it and using it to charge a battery. Every stage has inevitable power losses. Running on hydrogen might seem a better bet, but terrorists would find that very useful too, and you still have to make the stuff from energy in another form.
The real problem seems to be that at a time of panic, nobody thinks changes through.
Probably it’s time to retire this thread. I don’t think we’ll come to an agreement on this…
Possibly. But I do like the fact that people can discuss things here without becoming horrible to each other. I despair of much of the on-line discussion that takes place. We can disagree without becoming disagreeable – I hope.
Yes, always a good thing.
I love this blog – all the familiar names of people who begin to feel like friends, albeit friends I shall never meet. I feel so connected. I feel so well informed.
By the way, I’ve just finished the new book. Brilliant. And regarding the ‘top ten ways’ – this blog is one of the ways I am able to comply with numbers 5 and 6.
Ta.
Sasha,
Wherever you look there are big businesses. Some will gain out of the climate scam, others might lose. The point is that you can’t use the existence of particular big businesses to justify any position on CAGW or the cholesterol hypothesis. People baulk at Big Pharma because it runs the trials and other research that justify the sale of its profits, and pays for organisations that distort the facts, such as the CTTC.
In the case of ‘climate change’ (which used to be called global warming, but was renamed because there has been negligible warming since 1998) the situation is quite different. I haven’t spoken to anyone concerned about climate change, who actually knew the extent of the temperature rise. Most refused to even hazard a guess, sensing perhaps that this was a difficult question! The official extent of warming since 1880 is 0.8C. That figure in itself should make you suspicious – I mean how is it possible that we are suffering all the claimed climate catastrophes as a result of that tiny change in temperature? Perhaps that figure reminds you of the reciprocal of the NNT for statins – both are ridiculously small, and so are not mentioned in polite society.
Moreover, for many years, the temperature was recorded using weather thermometers that were good to 1C or maybe 0.5C. The entire figure could plausibly be composed entirely of experimental errors (of which there are quite a few).
My interest in this subject didn’t start after I received a fat envelope of cash from big oil, it started after my curiosity was piqued by the email hacking scandal. Why would WikiLeaks choose to protect that information so it could be viewed by everyone?
David, I’m talking about pollution, not global warming. It is my understanding that fossil fuels contribute more to pollution than renewables. It is also my understanding that technologies like EVs are more efficient than ICEs. New technologies will always compete with established businesses for breathing space. I don’t blame fossil fuel companies or pharma for trying to protect their bottom lines. They do what they do. I simply think that when we comment on here we should be able to back up our claims.
I’ve read and seen photos of Russian electric tractors – mains powered with long trailing cables, which probably didn’t help much. Back in the fifties or so I think and I assume the power came from coal-fired stations. Probably little advantage over diesel.
I’m reasonably sure that some big cities will be declared electric-only in the next ten years, for passenger cars at least. The tipping point for petrol-driven vehicles will come when it is no longer economical to operate petrol stations and they close down.
Yes, I also think it’s coming. Last year in Norway 52% of all new sales were either hybrids or EVs.
So that’s how they are going to stop people travelling. Shut filling stations so we will be able to go as far as the batteries allow.
Sasha, Norwegian electricity is 96% hydro power, so it makes sense to run their vehicles on electricity and sell their oil to those who want it. 50% of new cars are now electric, helped by lots of government incentives.
But maybe climate change will catch them out. Venezuela (64% hydropower) was forced to drastically cut consumption when their dams dried up.
Generally speaking, you want a mix of energy generators, and energy consumers, for security.
And here I was thinking they are doing it for environmental reasons…
Gary have you had . your share of the freezing and snowy weather in your part of California ?
I have been watching with interest the warmistas saying how the Gobal Warming is causing this big freeze !
Word Press is really stuffing me around when I try to comment. The above comment was by me, Bill in Oz.
Bill in Oz: It is good see you commenting in Climate, etc. with that same moniker. Why would WordPress decide to change they way you write your name? Strange.
B: We never get any sort of severe cold weather in the lowlands in California. Thus citrus is widely grown, and has been for decades. Even in the Sierra, where deep snows are normal in winter, the temperatures don’t often go below 0 (F) (-18C), except at the highest elevations.. We did have a bit of a cold snap lately, and on my hike this week I encountered snow below the 1,000′ level (normal for persistent snow is 4,000-5,000′) I’m laughing, too at the polar vortex being blamed on AGW. Like with the cholesterol theory, it’s one ad hoc hypothesis after another. As astonishingly complex as the human body is, climate is orders of magnitude more complex, and way bigger.
Gary, I think the climate scam will only end after some sort of awful tragedy. There are many possibilities:
Here in Britain, all new home gas boilers have to be very efficient, which means they need a computer board and therefore rely on electricity. In the event of an extended power cut – which seems ever more likely – a lot of house-bound people might die of hypothermia.
Yes, people will probably die in cold weather because electric cars and busses will not have the range in hilly areas.
So many services depend on electricity, I dread to think what could happen.
After such a tragedy, the media will hopefully, finally, focus on the evidence that shows that ‘climate change’ is a non-problem sitting among a whole stack of real problems that we aren’t addressing.
Having lived through the 1970 s when power cuts were common, and having raised two small babies under those circumstances, I would never be completely dependent on electricity.
We have a gas fire in the main room, which does not have mains electricity ignition, and a large gas hob which can be lit by hand. Also a stock of candles. So we can at least keep warm, have hot meals and see where we are going, if the power is off for a long time.
If we lose the gas as well we would be in trouble. I reckon I could cook on my husband’s garden incinerator in an emergency, provided we could get hold of firewood, but we could not heat the house at all. So it’s back to layers of woollies and staying under the duvet for the duration, and hoping the water pipes survive the cold.
Dr. John H – omega 3 fish oil
Since part 61 on strokes and your vit C comments, I’ve received the Liponaturals product (and posted a comment in part 61 on prices compared with Livon).
This prompted me to revisit the link you provided to Daniel Cobb’s site and his recommendations for arterial plaque, which include omega 3.
I take fish oil for 3 reasons:
(1) general health
(2) like vitamin C, humans can’t produce it and most importantly in my case (high CAC score) for
(3) arterial flexibility
Daniel Cobb’s recommendations/buyer’s guide is essentially:
(1) liquid or gel caps
(2) small containers
(3) black plastic containers
all of which should minimise rancidity of the oil.
However, the fish oil market is vast even with these recommendations.
I’m not sure if this is an appropriate request or not (for one thing, we all lead busy lives) – but here goes – would you have any recommendations?
Hi Charles,
I don’t recommend fish oil as I have read a lot of bad things about it. I do recommend cod liver oil, and since I am a big fan of Weston Price, I go with the Price Foundation’s recommendations. They tend to like the Green Pastures Fermented Cod Liver Oil and High Vitamin Butter Oil best, as well as a few others. There has been some controversy around the fermented cod liver oil, and while it seems fine to me, it may not be the best choice for some. Here are there recommendations:
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/cod-liver-oil/cod-liver-oil-basics-and-recommendations/#brands
Dr. John H: I, like many others left WAPF over this very issue. While they have done much good, I consider FCLO dangerously rancid, and am horrified that they are still promoting it. The reason is simple: this organization is run like a dictatorship; dissenting views are not allowed. The Board is mere window dressing. I do miss all the lovely people I met at the conferences.
Many years ago, Lancet sung a different tune:
“Far too large a section of the treatment of disease is to-day controlled by the big manufacturing pharmacists, who have enslaved us in a plausible pseudo-science.” — Sir William Osler, The Treatment of Disease Can Lancet 1909;42:899-912
Dr John H
Many thanks for the swift, informative and useful reply.
abdlomax : If you continue to take baby aspirin, have the iron feritin levels on your blood checked occasionally. Aspirin does have a tendency to cause anaemia from minor gastric bleeds. That’s what happened to me.
Thanks to those who have given me advice, and especially those who have shared links to decent pages with information, which I read with a level of skepticism, and their personal experience, which I read with a dose of “anecdotal experience,” Neither of those means ‘wrong,” just that I need to remember to trust reality instead of opinions, mine or others.
And I don’t actually know reality, other than, right now, I’m looking at a computer screen and my head itches a bit,and I’m realizing that I do have a problem with bleeding, though not necessarily “gastric.” I take the aspirin through one end, and I bleed at the other, partly the consequence of having a trans-rectal ultrasound procedure to diagnose prostate cancer. The first time I had one, the doctor was in a rush it seemed, and just shoved this large probe into a place not accustomed to such, and I bled for a week and from them on, I had what I had never noticed before, until now. (But I didn’t start on the aspirin until more recently.) Ah, trusting doctors can be a pain in the butt!
Thank you very much, I’m very unlikely to die from prostate cancer, what I have is not growing. Maybe thanks to high-fat, low-carb diet, and there goes an anecdote again! But it’s my life, and I get one shot at it each day.
As to bleeding from that end, I am deciding, right now, to start tapering off on the aspirin. I will talk with my physicians at some point about it, and I will see what happens. My point in dealing with physicians is that it is my life and my responsibility, and they are not gods, but potentially decent advisors whose advice is limited by their experience and to some extent by legal and social pressures.
Fortunately, I will die anyway some day, no use worrying about that, and it could even be the good news. That’s part of what trusting reality is about, and we never really know, until the end and maybe not even then.
Reality knows reality. If it was good enough for the creation of this beautiful, awesome universe, it’s good enough for me.
I noticed some time ago that aspirin gave me tinnitus so stopped using it. Ibuprofen too but not so badly.
Then a doctor persuaded me back on to the low dose aspirin. Even though I stopped, the tinnitus didn’t. I believe it may damage the small blood vessels in the inner ear. Some other NSAIDS are even worse, one dose can cause permanent tinnitus. With the aspirin it took a while but now appears to be permanent.
Diets Enriched in Fish-Oil or Seal-Oil have Distinct Effects on Lipid Levels and Peroxidation https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3738469/
I really wonder if trials on deliberately inbred hamsters are necessarily applicable to humans?
I have been taking seal oil for 10 years and my blood numbers are good as well as my damaged joins are better.
Randall: Good news about your joints. If you read Dr. Kendrick’s three books you will stop paying the slightest attention to your blood numbers. He completely lays waste to all the nonsense we’ve been taught about such things by such pharmaceutical hucksters as Professor Sir Rory Collins and an untold number of others. Drops a thermonuclear device on this pseudoscience, and creates of it dust so pulverized as to be invisible to the naked eye. The blood numbers don’t mean much unless they’re completely out of whack. I attribute my joint health to bone broth, vitamin C, and continual use. Luck may play a role, too. For good health approach life with zest, spread love and kindness wherever you can, and eat what you like. Food advice is another massive can of worms. Don’t believe a word of any official advice unless it is backed up by good evidence. My two cents, anyway.
Laboratory hamsters are relatively cossetted beasts until they are put down at the end of their working lives. Did not Dr Kendrick joke in one of his blogs, that they were always dying at inconvenient moments too, making it difficult to get decent sets of results?
My youngest grand-daughter, aged nine, has an apparently indestructible hamster, which survives on kitchen scraps and whatever it can scavenge. My son wishes it would just die like any normal hamster, because it tends to run free (how?) and makes one hell of a mess. How it has so far evaded the local foxes beats me.
I feel this is where the parallel with human life might lie!
I just finished another health book. Not to mention details other than it reminded me of this reply to the Lancet. It would not come to surprise to me that with this paper some are disappointed that patients are not crippled from side effects of statins. Maybe it makes for good additional business.
For me the highly skeptical view of the medical field I hold came mainly due to my stomach disease. The condition started early in my life. The response from the medical field to solve my severe issue was less than inspiring. They didn’t have a clue what was happening. More times than not I came to believe they were looking for ways to run up the bill with the insurance company. Hard to read minds but I started to believe this.
Not finding answers at the different hospitals visited I turned to the only place left to me, reading health books. I began researching, reading not only about my condition but other health conditions.
I worked in the health supplement field too. At work many alternative health books, papers, recordings would be sent to use. I was the only one that read them. It did open my eyes that there were more ideas out there that were being ignored by the medical community.
What really made me wonder about what was going on with the medical field had to due to genealogy of all things. In America a macabre practice is to order death certificates. It’s a way to obtain additional family information as the family member that fills out the certificate will mention parents name, where parents were born, etc.
During my family work I ran across a few puzzling death certificates. One puzzle was a great grandmother. She was listed as having died from hepatitis C. That was a shock. She didn’t have the typical thought of life style of someone that caught that disease.
I asked family members that knew my great grandmother about her having Hepatitis C. These were people that lived with her during her final years. It was a surprise to them. As far as they knew she never received treatment for hep C. I was told she died from the flu. It came on quickly, she was older, and it took her life.
I knew from my reading that some believe there is no hep C virus. Some feel the damage to the liver is caused by drugs, alcohol, other toxins. It makes sense to me. I suspect that theory could be true but likely will never be tested or better said examined.
Regardless, when my mom learned her grandmother had died from Hepatitis C she had a different reaction. Mom is more of a believer in modern medicine. As a result she went in for testing. Sure enough she came back positive for Hep C.
Her doctor was surprised. He said lets just monitor. No reason to treat. Her liver was testing well. She showed no signs of what is described as Hep C.
As crazy as I’ve come to believe the medical field is, it wouldn’t surprise me though if decades from now a future family genealogist will find his great grandmother (my mom) died from hepatitis C. Something has to be listed.
Soul,
I would at least try alternative medicine as a way to help with your stomach problem – but actually visit one, don’t just read the books.
I had very good results with sciatica, and most of these practitioners are cheap enough that they clearly only exist because many people find them beneficial and recommend them to others. I chose a centre that had a variety of treatments available, and let the man who saw me select the best for me – which turned out to be acupuncture.
You may find some of the jargon off-putting – energy fields, chi, Reiki, etc – but I would recommend you suspend judgement and just decide how you feel after a few treatments.
Thanks David. Wonderful advise. I entirely agree, a face to face visit can be beneficial in the alternative medical world in some cases I suspect. When it comes to stomach conditions for what ever reason I never found places to visit. I used to joke about that. It’s understandable really or possibly. Driving in a car any distance with a stomach problem isn’t desirable. It’s bad for business I would suppose, few potential customers want to leave the house.
With all my complaining of late I should add, I’m doing much better with the stomach. I have many complaints today. Compared to where I was in the past though I’m miles ahead in health and very thankful for that. Fingers crossed I’ll be able to improve further and become a more productive individual to society. For now I’m afraid I’m someone with to much time on his hands due to his illness.
I will add once I did find a chiropractor to visit for my stomach condition. It was quite a laugh really. He was about an hours drive away. I was nervous as can be to make the trip. And in the end it was the strangest, oddest experience I’ve had. To keep it short, the guy, who was yelling at me along with pulling on my arm as part of treatment, ended up putting acupuncture needles into the bottom of my foot and then left the room, turning off the lights on his way out, and then I could hear him eating lunch. I figured he placed the needles on the bottom of my feet so I couldn’t run away! With that said, I’m glad I went. The treatment obviously didn’t work for me but didn’t have any side effects, which i can’t say was true with some of the worthless treatments tried at different hospitals.
Alternatively a treatment I have found beneficial to me is earthing or grounding. I consider this acupuncture, something that I can do at home or walks around the yard. It seems if I earth long enough, and in a certain way, my stomach improves substantially for 24 hours.
Saw today the FDA sent warning letters out to alternative treatment businesses for Alzheimers disease. The FDA didn’t like the claims these groups or companies were making, saying the FDA had not approved them. To me FDA approval do not mean much, if anything. Any more it is just a company that had a lot of money and went through the FDA process. Marketing and promotion wise, for the general public saying FDA approval has some appeal. Businesses need the FDA. It provides the public confidence. Conversely the FDA needs to approve businesses products as the FDA receives payments. I believe around half the FDA’s operating funds comes from approving products or something like that.
You don’t say what your stomach problems are, but cabbage juice is near miraculous for many stomach ailments. Not the tastiest stuff, but well worth trying.
One can make a kind of minestrone, replacing the beans with savoy cabbage. Well seasoned, it’s very tasty. Would that work as well?
Has anyone on here have any thoughts on the theory that Auto immune diseases are caused by Vitamin A excess toxicity?
g genereux.blog
Jane
I do know that ordinary cod liver oil can give you an overdose of vitamin A.
TS: Yes, I would caution everyone about taking cod liver oil. CLO was developed by Norse fishermen living in the far north, where vitamin D is only available a few months of the year. The Atlantic cod has both vitamin A and D in a metabolically-appropriate ratio. But one has no idea, usually, of the provenance of the CLO in the store, or whether it has any vitamin D at all. Or whether it is rancid. Vitamin A toxicity, as I understand it, only occurs in those with poor vitamin D status. Vitamin A is an essential nutrient, but is easily obtained by eating liver (but not polar bear), and vitamin D from the sun or a pill in winter.
Gary
Don’t overdo the liver though, with it being a place where toxins lurk and are dealt with. Remember my little kitten to whom I stupidly fed what seemed at the time to be small pieces of lamb’s liver. A cat’s prey contains a tiny amount of liver in comparison, of course. My little kitten nearly died. He started dragging his hind legs and could barely stand. He recovered as soon as I stopped giving him the liver.
I find all offal disgusting and would assume that this is my body warning me not to eat it, if it were not for other people who, incomprehensively to me, find it delicious.
TS: The liver does not store toxins, it merely filters them. You are correct, though, to be cautious in quantities to consume or feed the cats. I eat 2-3 oz (56-84g) each of liver and heart once a week (both were occasional fare in my childhood). I find both delicious. I make the cat food, and it includes 4-5% chicken liver. If I am preparing liver, and they smell it, they go berserk, and they demand, and get, some small pieces. Never had a problem with liver and cats. Perhaps a small kitten cannot process it as well as an adult cat.
Gary,
Thanks for your input on the cod liver oil. I’m going to rethink my position on it. I read many of the WAPF related articles both for and against since Kayla Daniels came out with her FCLO (fermented cod liver oil) report a few years ago. My experience and others I observed with the FCLO has been good, though I personally haven’t taken it for some time. I also read lots of user reviews of the FCLO, with many, many stellar reviews, and also more than expected negative reviews.
Would you avoid other high end CLO’s such as Rosita?
If you have any article links to post i’d like to research more.
I do remember some years ago Mercola writing a negative CLO article (which WAPF disagreed with). At the time I thought his article was too narrowly focused.
Dr. John H: It appears that Rosita produces a high-quality product. This is what I would use if I took CLO.
Gary makes the point that: “But one has no idea, usually, of the provenance of the CLO in the store, or whether it has any vitamin D at all.”
There are a number of reputable manufacturers of CLO that clearly spell out the provenance of the oil and the range of values of vitamins A and D in a serving. (If a manufacturer states a precise amount of vitamins A and D per serving – rather than a range of values – then you can assume that these are synthetic vitamins that have been added to the oil.)
I think the problem for many brands of CLO is that the vitamins are largely destroyed in the production process and many manufacturers add synthetic vitamins back into the oil. Apparently some manufacturers add up to 30,000 IU of Vitamin A, with not much, if any, supplementation of Vitamin D, the level of which can be very low. This results in an inbalance between vitamin A and D, which has the potential to cause the vitamin A to become toxic.
With regard to rancidity of the oil, I take the oil straight, rather than in capsule form. It would be immediately obvious if there is a problem (I have never had a problem with the brand I use).
I think CLO is a worthwhile supplement; however, it pays to do your research first.
Jeffrey Dun: Correct. I am aware of one company in particular who produces high quality CLO, and are completely transparent in their production methods. After the FCLO fiasco, I simply steer clear of all of it. Easy enough to get all the benefits of CLO from food.
There has always been warnings about overdoses of vitamin A – not least from digesting ice bear liver among the polar explorers. Still our medical establishment who constantly warns against alternative treatments with vitamins are not able to proved solid evidence of injuries.
However from what I have read about the Inuits, who’s staple food was seal, the hunting teams honored the liver of a fresh seal catch by immediately sharing the fresh liver raw on the spot on the ice.
Today I don’t trust any warnings about “vitamin poisoning” – I always suspect Pig Pharma behind all alarms that pops up in media.
Besides I soon to devour a deer liver – grilled over charcoal.
And with the graves warnings about vitamin D I am daily on 2400 IU of the natural one with its eight components contrary to the synthetic single component. This seems to work pretty well with my angina but officially I should probably be more than dead on such a dose.
And when I now searched the official records there was actually very little on the dangers with vitamins – the only one seemed to be about vitamin E.
BTW no-one has ever been recorded to have died from vitamin poisoning while roughly one third of all death are related to pharmaceuticals.
Killer whales (orcas) enjoy a meal of shark liver. They are wiping out one of our big tourist attractions, the great white sharks of False Bay. The speculation is that their prey has declined elsewhere, so they are moving into False Bay where they were previously rare or unknown.
Are sharks being attacked by killer whales off Cape Town’s coast?
In 2017, it is suspected that these same two killer whales were also responsible for the death of five great white sharks further up the coast in Gansbaai.
Similar to the sevengill sharks, the wound pattern was the same and the shark’s livers were missing. Examination of the carcasses by scientists showed that the sharks had large, gaping wounds between their pectoral fins and their livers were missing, while the rest of the internal organs like heart, stomach and reproductive organs were left behind.
There were distinct bite marks on the pectoral fins of the dead sharks. These evenly spaced, circular tooth impressions were identified as most likely being from a “flat-toothed” killer whale, which is rare in coastal waters. There were no bites anywhere else on the body, indicating that the killer whale (or whales) had likely pulled on the pectoral fins to open up the body cavity, to remove the liver. The sharks’ liver accounts for up to a third of its weight and is rich in fat, a nutrient that killer whales seek out.
Gary
After diagnosis of mild hip arthritis, my GP in what I might refer to as a throwaway comment, suggested that i might consider CLO. That was nearly 8 yrs ago and I appear not to hav any side effects. Indeed it is perhaps a coincidence, but it gives me almost no trouble. (Unless I decide to do 10 mins on threadmill)
Jane:
Another thought. I wish food and drug scientists would look to Newton’s third law of motion: that for every action (force) there is an equal and opposite reaction.
The body seeks balance. Overdosing on drugs can have the opposite effect to that intended. Why can’t the same thing apply to vitamins? Some say Vitamin A deficiency may be linked to autoimmune diseases, but in excess?
Everything in moderation? It is a shame that we get so scared of not getting enough of something that we overdose on it. Perhaps less is more.
For reference Google “Paradoxical and bidirectional drug effects”
Suppression of oxidative stress in endothelial cells. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5089944/
As an engineer myself (looking for “root causes”) I am very taken by the engineer Ivor Cummins getting involved in explaining CVD and “how it works”. He brings up insulin sensitivity as the big elephant versus the LDL cholesterol as the mouse by comparison.
Here is a great talk by him
He is also extensively brings up what my favorite Dr. Kraft realized when clinically testing 15 000 patients for standard glucose sensitivity test response and plasma insulin levels at the same time.
Very interesting to say the least!
Today is the 210th birthday of Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin, neither of whom took statins, the pity, as they might have been two of those 8,000 lives saved.
Gary, that’s amazing. I didn’t realise statins could stop bullets.
Statins can do anything that Snake-Oil, could, and then more!
(Allegedly)
Very simple mechanism: taking statins leads to fewer dying from bullets. Same thing for activity. If you stay at home, don’t get out, and definitely don’t do anything worth wasting bullets on, because you are too effing depressed, fewer deaths from bullets!
I’m serious: if a large enough study were done, I would expect something as a headline:
“New Statin Study finds 30% reduction in deaths from gunshot wounds!.”
Or Sirius, at least.
Oh, didn’t you know? Statins can do absolutely EVERYTHING.
Long-term measles-induced immunomodulation increases overall childhood infectious disease mortality
Immunosuppression after measles is known to predispose people to opportunistic infections for a period of several weeks to months. Using population-level data, we show that measles has a more prolonged effect on host resistance, extending over 2 to 3 years. We find that nonmeasles infectious disease mortality in high-income countries is tightly coupled to measles incidence at this lag, in both the pre- and post-vaccine eras… Our data provide an explanation for the long-term benefits of measles vaccination in preventing all-cause infectious disease. By preventing measles-associated immune memory loss, vaccination protects polymicrobial herd immunity.
Martin Back, from the linked article”Extra dividends from measles vaccine
Vaccination against measles has many benefits, not only lifelong protection against this potentially serious virus…………..”
Well we know how accurate and truthful that statement is, so how truthful is the rest of the article?
Ah, are you a Russian troll? ;o)
Are Russian Trolls Saving Measles From Extinction?
Scientific researchers say Russian social-media trolls who spread discord before the 2016 U.S. presidential election may also have played an unintended role in a developing global health crisis.
They say the trolls may have contributed to the 2018 outbreak of measles in Europe that killed 72 people and infected more than 82,000 — mostly in Eastern and Southeastern European countries known to have been targeted by Russia-based disinformation campaigns.
Experts in the United States and Europe are now working on ways to gauge the impact that Russian troll and bot campaigns have had on the spread of the disease by distributing medical misinformation and raising public doubts about vaccinations.
From Radio Free Europe, probably one of the most trollacious sites on the internet.
Martin Back, I merely quoted from tet linked article. I am now wondering if you are under the influence of medication. I know I am not as I don’t take any.
Ah, I was having a bit of fun (note the winky). I’m certain you’re not a Russian troll and your opposition to vaccination is based on sound evidentiary reasons.
My point was more of a political one, namely that the ‘Russian troll’ meme is being pushed to the point of absurdity. Next thing they’ll be blaming hair loss and impotence on Russian trolls.
It’s also rather worrying, in that there appears to be an agenda to inflame opinion against the Russians as a prelude to… hostilities, maybe? I hope not. Things could go pear-shaped rather quickly.
Martin, Russians must be the evil ones. Putin told the illuminati banksters to take a hike. Such is their arrogance they cannot take rejection.
PS. I don’t take any medication either. After reading Dr Kendrick I have become far more relaxed about numbers like cholesterol count that supposedly indicate my state of health.
I guess I have turned into a profound vaccine “sceptic” to say the least. I was basically Dr. Suzanne Humphries and her book “Disease, Vaccines, and the Forgotten History” who completely “twisted my head” also in this last stronghold for traditional medicine in my head.
!!!
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DzNSuTUWkAAlvTi.jpg:large
Is it me, or is it wordpress? I get emails about posted comments. When I used to reply, my email address and name was already filled in. Now I have to enter it every time. Anyone else notice this?
AhNotepad: Yes. Minor annoyance, though. The man behind the curtain strikes again.
Here is my reply to your message. My email address and name are filled in.
Maybe some of us are special….for now.
AhNotepad – re WordPress. Yes, from time to time and I don’t know why. I just regard it as a extra bit of exercise. 😉
WordPress have been screwing me around a lot. When I reply or make a comment, my ‘handle’ is wrong and when I try to change it I am made to sign in and then told I am not the right person or some such nonsense.
I have had the same problems for months now, just unable to post. Infuriating. Sigh.
This seems to be a frequent comment or complaint. I’d suggest to Dr Kendrick that he create a FAQ to address what amount to login problems, almost certainly. This is a WordPress.com blog, and my subscription is through wordpress.com. Without knowing details about the accounts involved, such as “does one have an account?”, it’s difficult to say much. One might have an account and be logged out, and I have experienced problems because I had multiple accounts and was trying to log into the wrong one. I would go to the wordpress.com individual account page. Does this show account information? If so, you would be logged in. But if not, not. The login page has buttons for forgotten password, and other options. One can log in through Google, but I have multiple Google accounts, and this can cause confusion. It can take some patience to work out the problem.
We are just people who post, we do not have an account. The account holder is the blog author.
Then how do you expect the system to know who you are without filling in the information?
Your browser might fill it in from a previous session. Sometimes. This has nothing to do with WordPress or Dr. Kendrick. A cookie on your computer may hold that user information, but will often drop it, I don’t know all the details. If you make any mistake, the browser can get confused. I have a blog and I would work this out for a user having difficulty with my blog; I would generally recommend they create an account instead of simply relying on the facility for anonymous comments. Accounts are still anonymous, but email addresses are verified, whereas they are not for ordinary anonymous accounts.
Mostly likely, something is confusing your browser. Because I have a WordPress.com account, I never see this problem (except when my log-in had lapsed and I had forgotten the details).
”Then how do you expect the system to know who you are without filling in the information?
”
abdlomax, it seemed quite reasonable to me, having been posting replies to several dozen of these blogs, when the email address and user name was filled in, to expect it to continue. I am not the only person who has noticed recently addresses and user names have not been filled in.
So that’s how I expect the system to know who I am, because it had no trouble doing so for a long time. Perhaps it has been prescribed a statin, and can no longer remember.
Almost certainly it is your computer/browser. I am not sure of all the details. When I write a post and I am not confident that it will go through, I copy it before submitting. Stuff often gets eaten if something is not quite right. It takes a fraction of a second. From where is that data filled in? Almost certainly, your browser is doing it, and that data can be lost in any of many ways. I’m logged in to WordPress.com and this edit window displays “you are commenting using your WordPress.com account.” If I don’t see that I know to be careful, copy the message, and then log in. If I try to log in with a message pending, it will often be lost.
Lots of people are fanatic on the vaccine issue, both ways. By “fanatic” I mean those who consider opposing opinions to be evil, immoral, and probably fattening.
This beast is screwing me up now I have tried setting up an account, as a result it just eats my replies. I wish I hadn’t tried. Ive had to change my email address and the coloured box thing has changed too.
Thank you : It has been very difficult. Locked out from commenting or even giving a ‘rate’ sign, and this since early 2017, when I was away helping a friend whose husband had sustained a massive heart attack – he is now sadly on the dreaded statins, in spite of a naturally low cholesterol level. Sad. But I keep plugging away, hoping to get through !
Yes. I had a bona-fide a/c with WordPress and this blog, for a long time in fact. But, just ‘might’ have sorted. We’ll see. At least in the meantime I was receiving updates, and could log into the blog.
It is dire what is going on, the obscene corruption out there – a disaster to good medicine and good science. A T’shirt is in order. Cholesterol feeds my Brain – wait on, that could attract ribald some comments ! Back to the drawing board …
Dr John H, Charles Gale,
Regarding fish oil: Vin Kutty is someone who knows an incredible amt on this. Just google him or Omega Via or the sister company Innovix Labs. Omegavia has scads of info under “Fish Oil Articles”. Vin K won’t touch FCLO with a ten foot pole. I am using some of their products and am very pleased and their prices are also very reasonable. They are in the US. Also, a big thanks to the responses to my vitamin c post in Part 61. It was appreciated!
Just a general comment of how to get “knowledge”.
1. You must be interested in the actual subject.
2. On blogs and internet you can get ideas which merit being followed up and especially where to find the deep serious information from knowledgeable and skeptical medical people as e.g. in Dr. Kendrick’s books
3. The “following up” must be done through serious reading of dedicated books, though few people today have this inclination.
The cleverer you are the worse it gets?
“We think your son Albert might be mentally retarded.”
Professional opinion given to Albert Einstein’s parents.
David Bailey
My 57 yr old neighbour has begun a course of statins, lowest dose he tells me. He has taken his GPs word over mine. Well after all his GP is better qualified to advise on such things than me so naturally enuff the GPs advice is seen to better sourced than mine. About 2 mins in he is not aware of any side effects but will giv it 12 months before he makes up his mind.
I refuse to argue with him. Time will tell.
Elsha – fish oil
Many thanks for your comment on fish oil. It’s reassuring that my recent purchase of Innovix’s “Pharma-Grade Omega-3” coincides with your comment…and it’s gel caps and in dark containers too!
I’ve googled OmegaVia and there’s plenty of reading to do.
Here’s the link to their site:
https://omegavia.com/about-us/
Also, for those who like to do their due diligence and are concerned about their fish oil supplementation and its purity and so on, you can check things out on the IFOS website (International Fish Oil Standards). Here’s the link:
http://consumer.nutrasource.ca/ifos/fish-oil-facts/
With reference to your vitamin C thread in part 61, I have revisited (a few days ago) your thread, having received the liposomal vit C referenced by Dr John H.
He’s right – it looks like Baileys but sadly not the taste. Yuk! Perhaps like all medicines which do you good, it tastes horrible! But more affordable than LivonLabs, even with UK tax added.
The statin scandal is now beyond a joke. Those who suffer the side effects find them life changing – sporting activities become impossible, and even sitting around can hurt – at least they stop taking the drug. I mean medicine can be unpleasant some times, but this must be the only medicine that you give to well people that can mess them up so much.
It is trivially easy to elicit statin horror stories from people of my age, and it is hard to believe that anyone would take a statin if they knew the NNT, or the short extension to life that is achieved on average even when this treatment ‘works’.
Isn’t it time that Doctors started to object on mass to what is going on? Can any GPs really be ignorant of what these drugs can do? Don’t they realise the enormous harm they are inflicting on their patients. If they really don’t know, how about making a questionnaire available in surgeries!
Funny!
I just read the “history” about scurvy and vitamin C.
What stroke me was how difficult it was for the community to accept and especially implement obvious proven facts about the importance of proper food for the health.
David, I invite your comments to my current saga, and anyone else who cares to respond.
15 years of being a type 2 diabetic. All stable until end of last year, so back in ‘the system’ and receiving excellent care and advice.. Situation quickly resolved, and back to normal, by being monitored closely, ( thank you NHS staff), BUT, total cholesterol stagnating at 7.4, whilst HbA1c behaving nicely at 48 and all other measurements taken are very good, and well within acceptable parameters. Liver function fine, liver scan….shows minor fatty liver not requiring any attention. Eye tests OK. Weight and BMI is what many could only dream about ….lovely jubbly is what I say. (Surgery B/P not playing fair….home B/P is doing well, I wonder why?)
However,I am being repeatedly requested to re-start statins, despite my objections now for nearly 6 years.
Why,?
David,
From Uffe Ravnskov:
“In 2004–2005, health authorities in Europe and the United States introduced New Clinical Trial Regulations which specified that all trial data had to be made public. Since 2005, no statin trial has been successful.”
http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/4010662
Dr. John H, I am familiar with the situation regarding statin studies, but there was an article on BBC Radio 4 this week about the frightening number of parents not getting their children vaccinated, and that frightening 2% (eh? How frightening is that?) do not accept that vaccines have undergone stringent safety studies and are far safer than the consequences of contracting, er, measles, or even chicken pox. Have any vaccine safety studies been conducted since 2005 to your knowledge?
The BBC guest claimed that in some recent outbreak(s) 70 children had died, needless to say there were no details of the health state of the children before vaccination. Given the CDC’s oft quoted figure of 36,000 annual flu deaths in the US, and the claim most could be avoided by vaccinating you can possibily understand my misgivings.
AhNotepad,
Vaccine Studies are just like statin studies, where the positive ones are faked, and the negative ones are buried and their authors publicly humiliated. Suzanne Humphries is the real expert here, and I recommend buying her book, even just as a reference and to show solidarity. She is a Malcolm of vaccines.
Since vaccine manufacturers are shielded from liability from the government, they have zero incentive to produce safe vaccines, or to study it.
The Weston Price Foundation just came out with this small study of vaccinated vs. unvaccinated children. https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/vaccinations/chronic-disease-a-study-of-vaccinated-and-unvaccinated-children/
JFK Jr. sued the government (and won) for not complying with vaccine safety mandates:
Dr. John H, thank you for the information. I have the same view, and much of it confirmed by Suzanne Humphries book, which I use as a reference whenever people tell me vaccine cured smallpox and why is it we accept scarlet fever but think we have to vaccinate against anything we have an expensive toxin for. The link is very good but will take some study to get into my weapons store.
Suzanne’s book had a critical article appear shortly after publication, written by someone called Isabella, who could be reached on twitter. This caused me some worry until I came across Suzanne’s rebuttal which exposed all the false claims by Isabella, and pointed out that with a 400 page book there must have been a group effort to produce the critisms in the time available. Big pharma perhaps?
The autism association with vaccines will always raise heated discussions, but allergies are another matter. Allergies tie up with the claims by the manufacturers in that the adjuvants are to raise the response of the immune system, infact they hyperstimulate the immune system many times and then refuse to accept it causes allergic reactions. They can’t have it both ways.
Anyone who hasn’t seen “vaccines revealed” should look it up.
I think it is time we the public, the patients, the tax payers who ultimately fund the NHS drugs bills, who have the ability to have found the awareness of the truth that our knowledgable, free speaking and above all honest Medics internationally are telling us; it is time we campaigned and informed all parts of our NHS from the CCGs though to every level of the NHS structure and its governing bodies and Parliamentary leaders and committees that these drugs and side effects are unacceptable, financially and medically, and if change cant be brought about by all the medical and clinical knowledge out there for reasons we know, then it must be shovved along by the masses doing our bit. I would like it mandatory in medical traning in the UK that all medical students have to read and understand at least the published works of DrKendrick, Dr D Graveline, the trials info by Daid Evans and books by the Yusephs. Only then should any Dr be permitted to prescribe a statin, and the patient shold then be fully moniored, as some of us patients have no idea that what starts to happen to us after taking statins are side effects of statins. I was lucky, I came accross this blog, which opened my eyes, then read books. My son has just been dx with Type 2, mid 30’s, prescribed statins, He saw what they did to me, he obviously has FH (runs in paternal side) and has been prescribed statins. GP wold not llisten to him, he had high BP, but GP wants him on statins instead, so he succumbed and got the prescription but is not taking them. Despite reading this blog, he feels unable to tell his GP why he wont take them.
We as the public need to speak up now to support allthe wonderful work you medics have done, and I am now retired early due to ill health (the statins finished me off!!) and have decided I must begin writing to the NHS in the next few months. Has anyone else, ie unqualified public/patient, tried this appraoch yet or could asvise me, especially of the NHS structure and layers?
You might not get very far with this. Just look at what happened to Dr. Goetzche recently.
Deborah, I fully endorse your statement. Unfortunately I have no pointers to help you to get your message heard. .
I seem to be in a defeatist frame of mind this week. After witnessing the most appalling lack of care brought on by the ‘gate-keeper’ ( in this case by a non-medical receptionist) system of our glorious NHS, I am at a loss as to what to do about ‘the system’. I have been a bed-manager, out patients manager, ward nurse in both NHS and private. I have been outspoken in Staff meetings to the point of complete silence by those present, ( ‘cos they knew I was telling it as it was), followed by whispered apologies in private, saying how much they would have supported me, but were afraid to speak out.
I have written to my MP on occasions ( all persuasions), over 50 odd years, to no effect. My latest contact was insisting that the MP passed on my concerns to the Minister of State for Health, and it took persistent attempts and pressure to get the message passed on to the Department. All I have ever received are platitudes, written by Civil Servants, signed by the politician of course, suggesting that I have nothing to worry about(!).
I have been involved in politics, and believe me, I can’t even fathom how that works to our benefit.
Like you, Deborah, I would welcome answers as to how to get the statin /cholesterol message across.
I always thought that a university education involved looking at both sides of the equation, and not being indoctrinated by one specific concept. Seems I was wrong about that too.
Jennifer
I have had the same experience in staff meetings to the point that when I left work a colleague said, “Who is going to speak up for us now?” Do they think we enjoy having to be forthright? (I am a gentle soul deep down as I am sure you are!)
Deborah, unilaterally I stopped taking beta blockers. The admin staff were displeased, the older GP was more matter of fact about it. At the time of stopping I was coincidentally stopping having most carbohydrates. I think this was probably the reason I no longer needed beta blockers.
It could be difficult discussing statins with a GP who isn’t receptive. They don’t have much time in their training to read the truth, they are fed the propaganda on which they are later assessed, and most of the population is brainwashed into believing (ha, a faith system) cholesterol is the wy to CVD. They don’t get much on vitamins (vita = essential ie we can’t do with out them, and min = mineral). They do however get a huge amount about the modern toxic substances called drugs which are supposed to cure ills. This is the same with vaccines which, like statins, have near zero scientific support, but they have the same belief system, and unqualified oiks like me are ignorant, and if people don’t get vaccinated they spread diseases. I don’t get vaccinated, don’t get the flu, do have tens of kg of vitamin C in the house, and everyone else who has started using it has found life much brighter, they get ill less, and they get over things sooner. Vitamin C is known to strenghten tissues including blood vessels, as a result the blood vessels suffer less damage, consequently they need less repair work, so the liver can lower cholesterol production. Which is what was wanted, but this time it has been done by fixing the problem, which was sub-clinical scurvy caused by a vitamin C deficiency. But what do I know?
David
I like your proactive attitude here, since little is achieved by just bemoaning things.
Hi AhNotepad, you know enough to have the choice of how to look after your health, and successfully it sounds, and to advise others. There are so many out there without this knowledge and worse, who dont even know they have an information defecit. Many rely on what their GP tells them. I did, what a mistake that was.
Sasha, indeed I may not get very far at all, but I dont feel as on ordinary rather slow witted person I have anything to loose except time, and that would be well spent. My son wanted an insulin pump when he was 8 years old, before they were on the NHS, we were referred to social services by his old fashioned paediatrician (now retired) for putting his life at risk, along with another child whose parents were following the same route, fortunately we were able to access a fantastic knowlegable NHS specialist, who supported him and enabled this (he was one of the first 50 pumpers in the UK), he then went to the houses of Parlaiment to meet our MP and show him his pump, got his support and we joined INPUT (patient campaign group) and wer instrumental in getting NICE to include children in accessig pumps on the NHS. They even accepted our parents questionaire as anecdotal evidence as at that stage there werent any UK trials with children.
Jennifer and YTS, I agree, I dont want to do this, but if I do nothing, and everyone else at the bottom does nothing(not that Im saying you lot are where I am!!) then I am guilty of letting the situation continue as I stand by and watch. I havent been to good this year but now feel that I am happy to try and fail rather than to stand by. If I can understand this statin thing, them it should be a doddle for people training to be heathcare professionals, and for existing ones to be updated. The Earth isnt flat, so Ive heard! Id love company on this journey, but am happy to travel alone if need be!
Deborah, well done for the effort you put in to get your sons situation improved. That can’t have been easy.
If you think anyone is ahead of you, it is probably by only one step at the most, and in other matters some of us are several steps behind.
What I write may be perceived as advice, but that is my incorrect assembly of words. I would not intentionally give advice, especially on this blog. There are several medically qualified people here who could shoot me down in flames, and quite rightly if I were to suggest the wrong thing. I’m comfortable in suggesting where people could look to get inforemation (and the information I agree with). Another useful source for vitamin C is Tom Levy. His view that vitamin C can work as an antidote to any toxin is worth noting. Also Dr Tenpenny (I’ve forgotten her first name.
HI AhNotepad, I read a post about how important vit c is in sepsis and the article. I passed it on to a friend in children’s A&E as know they often get babies and children in with life threatening sepsis where they have to whack anti biotics in without delay. She said it was really interesting but no evidence base for them to use it. Maybe something that should be investigated asap as we know the present issues with anti biotics. It would be interesting to see if addition of vitamin c changed outcomes in this young age group.
Deborah, this is where I have to bite my lip. However, to say there is no evidence for use of vitamin C in treating sepsis is bordering on willful negligence. A recent article highlighted by Suzanne Humphries was about a study published in 2014 by Fowler et al. This is pub med ref 24484547. There is also a link http://europepmc.org/articles/Pmc3937164
The amounts of ascorbate given were far lower than would have given an even better outcome than those detailed. This article alone would give the authority a practicioner would need for legal protection, though would probably still be rejected by the idiots who run NICE and Public Health (surely “Sick” Ed.) England have the pharma generated brown noses.
Hoffer, Cathcart, Albert Szent-Györgyi, Klenner and others have had recorded success with high dose IV vitamin C. Fortunately it is possible to find practicioners in the UK who will administer IV vit C for around £150 for 100g. When your life is on the line it is a very cheap option, and unlike antibiotics it does not damage other parts of the system which are vital at a time when the immune system has to be as effective as possible.
Hi AhNotepad, thanks for the reference and names, I’ll follow it up and pass the info on to my friend.
“Almost all the prescription drugs currently taken by millions of people lead to a gradual depletion of vitamins and other essential cellular nutrients in the body.” The UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended that drinking water contain 25-50 mg of magnesium per liter to prevent deaths from heart attack and stroke. http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/pharmaceuticals-drive-magnesium-levels-lower
That may be true, though adding anything, even with the best intentions, to drinking water, is not a course we should be going down.
That’s because the drugs are toxins, and the vitamins get used up dealing with the toxins. I think the problem can be reduced by megadoses of vitamin C
Dr Malcolm,
This JAMA article has been popular in the medical press lately. It suggests that you must adhere to your statin regimen or die.
It would be good to have an official Dr Malcolm deconstruction of this threat.
“Response To The JAMA Paper”, perhaps?
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/article-abstract/2724695
From the abstract:
“The primary outcome was death of all causes adjusted for demographic and clinical characteristics, as well as adherence to other cardiac medications.”
I haven’t read the full paywalled paper, but if the abstract is accurate, it suggests adherence to statin therapy helps you live longer, period, depending on your age, sex, ethnicity, other disease state, and are compliant with “other cardiac medications”. At least it you’ve been prescribed statins.
Sounds pretty ambiguous and fishy to me.
Maybe instead of “other disease state” I should have said “overall disease state”. Note the abstract says nothing about CVD or stroke.
I grabbed a copy of the paper from sci-hub. I find it difficult to read. I’m looking forward to seeing Dr. Kendrick’s comments, if he reviews this. It does show the effect of what is called “MPR”, “possession” of a statin prescription, on all-cause death. MPR does not prove compliance, but would surely be associated with it. First prescriptions were ignored (excluded from the study), so these would all be refills.
It’s a large study, in terms of number of participants (and deaths), but relatively short term. The population was obviously high-risk. “There were 85,930 deaths (24.8%) during a mean (SD) of 2.9 (0.8) years of follow-up.” The study population was 347,104.
I’m not confident I understand it yet, I found the way the data was presented confusing. However:
From the Figure. Survival Curves by Statin Adherence Level as Defined
by Medication Possession Ratios (MPRs)
800 days, roughly 87.5% of the high MPR group (>90% compliance) had survived. About 84% of the low-compliance group (<50%) had survived. About 3.5% reduction in absolute risk over that period. There are many details of interest in the paper, including a host of assumptions, some of which, at least, are cited to other studies, which I intend to read. Some of it appears doubtful to me, but I've just been re-reading Taubes from Good Calories, Bad Calories, and my level of trust in “peer-reviewed” research on these issues is in the pits.
Why walking in a forest is healthy – Effect of phytoncide from trees on human natural killer cell function. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20074458
Some years ago I read a New Scientist article that said trees emitted chemicals that were calming to humans. It was speculated that this was a result of our distant past when we lived in trees and we become calm because of an ancestral memory that trees represent “home” and hence safety and security.
At the time I had a very stressful job. There was a grove of trees in a parking area nearby so I went out and stood among them. I immediately felt calmer, and after that always took my lunch break among the trees. I don’t know if it’s because of ancestral memory or some other mechanism, but trees definitely have a calming effect in my experience.
Japanese call it “forest therapy”, I think.
I guess that this is well known and it works fine for me and my wife.
Gary, have you noticed someone is giving our vaccine posts the 👎🏽 if the posts are in any way not pro-vaccine? Maybe that’s why wordpress access is becoming more tedious.
AhNotepad wrote:
This beast is screwing me up now I have tried setting up an account, as a result it just eats my replies. I wish I hadn’t tried. Ive had to change my email address and the coloured box thing has changed too.
The “colored box thing is an Avatar, and it may be automatically assigned to new accounts, or you can choose the image displayed. That it changes is a sign that you have created a new account. This can be mind-f complicated. I have two different Google accounts that I can use to log in, and neither one is the one I want to use here, this one, which goes back to 2010.
Bottom line, though, it’s you. It is not WordPress, almost certainly. And it can all be insanely complicated to fix, when one is not completely familiar.
As to downvoting, I just looked over many of your comments in this thread. There were few downvotes. While conspiratorial downvoting can occur (I’m very active on Quora), it’s fairly rare and you will gain nothing by claiming it, nothing but aggravation.
Bottom line is if it’s complicated too fix, it’s wordpress, not me.
Thank you for your input, but the down voting comment was addressed to Gary.
Was that investigative journalist MD by any chance?