2005 - Deaths Linked to Heart Drugs

[Guest guest]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1512613_1,00.html

EXPERTS are calling for a complete safety review of heart drugs taken by

millions of Britons. Government figures released last week show that 92 deaths

have been linked to the statin drugs developed to lower cholesterol.

It is believed that the death toll could be higher because doctors are reluctant

to blame drugs they prescribe for harming patients.

 

 

 

More than 37 of the deaths were attributed to a formulation called simvastatin

which is now being sold over the counter in low doses under the brand name

Zocor.

 

Many specialists are concerned that the drug, produced by Merck, should be

available without a prescription. A statin called Lipitor, made by Pfizer, was

associated with 36 of the deaths.

 

Three other leading statin brands — Novartis’s Lescol, BMS’s Lipostat and

AstraZeneca’s Crestor — have been associated with 19 deaths since they were

introduced in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

 

As well as the deaths there have also been reports of 7,000 side effects

reported to the Department of Health by doctors, including kidney and liver

damage and muscle weakness.

 

Doctors accept that the cholesterol-lowering effects of statins have saved

thousands of people from dying prematurely of heart disease, but question

whether they should have been distributed so widely. There are an estimated 3.9m

people taking the drugs, almost a third more than a year ago.

 

The drug companies are targeting at least 4m more middle-aged Britons said to be

at “moderate risk” of a heart attack in the next 10 years because they are over

55 and overweight.

 

Anxiety about overuse of the drugs is coupled with a growing body of research

suggesting the connection between cholesterol levels and health is more complex

than previously thought. A number of investigations have found that people with

higher amounts of cholesterol live longer than those with lower levels,

suggesting it may only be a cause of heart disease in much younger people.

 

Next month an inquest is to take place into the death of Ivor Meacher, 71, a fit

former tennis coach from Okehampton, Devon, who became ill and died within weeks

of being prescribed a statin for an irregular heartbeat.

 

Research by his daughter, Jay Ballard, has produced what she says is irrefutable

evidence that his death was caused by the drug atorvastatin, manufactured by

Pfizer and marketed in Britain as Lipitor.

 

She was, however, unable to persuade her father’s doctors to make an official

report of the death through the government’s “yellow card” scheme for adverse

drug reactions.

 

Eventually she contacted Andrew Herxheimer, emeritus fellow of the United

Kingdom Cochrane Centre and co-founder of DIPEx (an electronic database of

patients’ experiences) in Oxford. He has filed a yellow card on her behalf.

 

Cholesterol, a type of fat, is needed in the body for the production of

hormones, but if there is too much it sticks to the walls of blood vessels and

eventually blocks them. Statins block a liver enzyme needed to produce

cholesterol.

 

The body reacts by pulling in cholesterol from the bloodstream, thus lowering

circulating levels.

[Guest guest]

Regarding cholesterol, a question I have posed to the medical

community and have gotten nothing in answer except a blank stare is...

 

They tell us that when your cholesterol level is too high, it begins

to " stick " to the walls of the arteries and therefore thicken the

walls, eventually closing off the artery, causing a heart attack.

 

Bringing their " logic " out into the physical world and trying to apply

it, I look at a river. Now the water in narrow parts of rivers is

fast moving and tends to erode the walls of the river, not lay sludge

down along those walls. In fact, where the sludge in a river is

formed is where the river is wider and slower moving. Now with that

in mind, I go back to our bodies and I ask the allopathic physician,

why is it that if in fact it is an overabundance of cholesterol in our

blood that causes the cholesterol to be laid down on the walls of the

arteries is it that there is not a much larger problem with much

thicker layers of cholesterol laying down along the walls of the veins?

 

The arteries are the vessels leaving the heart, delivering the blood

to all parts of the body. The veins return the blood to the heart.

The arteries are much like the faster moving parts of the river where

the walls of the riverbank erode, and the veins are much like the

slower moving parts of the river where the sludge is deposited. If we

are to believe that too much cholesterol in the blood is the cause of

cholesterol-blocked arteries, then obviously the veins should be at

least as blocked as the arteries, shouldn't they?

 

My theory is that when the blood is thick, such as when one is not

drinking sufficient water, that the heart must beat harder to push the

thicker blood (high blood pressure) through the arteries, and in doing

so the thicker blood creates more friction on the walls of the

arteries, which in turn begins to thin the walls of the arteries. I

submit that cholesterol is one of the body's defense mechanisms laid

down on the walls of the arteries to prevent the walls of the arteries

from failing and causing a stroke.

 

I believe that artificially lowering cholesterol using pharmaceutical

drugs is a dangerous practice. If cholesterol is too high (and in my

opinion the allopathic medical community has set the line of " high "

cholesterol much too low) then address the underlying cause, not the

symptom of high cholesterol.

 

Kat

[Guest guest]

Kat, has anyone ever explained why the blockages seem to be concentrated

around the heart - there are many other arteries in the body.......

Perhaps Linus Pauling was correct in his explanation of what causes the

arteries to be blocked near the heart.....

Regards

Jorge

[Guest guest]

It could be a combination of factors, the vitamin C deficiency and

dehydration may individually affect the vessels, or combine. My

suspicion is that the body, as it has many backup systems, probably

can deal with some deficiences, but not so much with multiple, and

water is one thing for which there is no substitute.

 

As far as the blockages seeming to concentrate more around the heart -

it is the most important muscle in the body - I would suspect that the

body would be much more protective of the heart. Also, as the heart

is where the blood is being pumped from, the pressures would probably

be the the greatest in the arteries of the heart.

 

Perhaps we have a synergy between the water and the vitamin C. While

the water helps to keep the blood thinner and less viscous, therefore

keeping it from thinning the walls of the arteries, the vitamin C is a

necessary nutrient that the body is using to rebuild and strengthen

the walls of the arteries themselves. Therefore, perhaps if you give

the body the vitamin C it needs, even if you are dehydrated, the body

can keep the artery walls in good enough repair that it does not need

the cholesterol " patches " to keep the arteries from blowing out. And

conversely, if you are not getting enough vitamin C in your diet, if

you are maintaining a good hydration level, then damage is not being

done to the vessels in the first place, and again you do not need the

cholesterol patches.

 

If you are dehydrate and vitamin C deficient, then you may be giving

the body a double whammy - thinning walls and no good materials to

maintain them, so then cholesterol is used to patch them. Now, enter

the cholesterol-lowing medications, taking nothing into consideration

except that the cholesterol is increased, and not treating the

underlying issues which have caused the body to increase its

cholesterol production (only 20% of your cholesterol comes from

diet...the body makes 80% of it). I think this is a prescription for

disaster.

 

Kat

 

 

, " Jorge Roshkov "

<jroshkov@b...> wrote:

>

> Kat, has anyone ever explained why the blockages seem to be concentrated

> around the heart - there are many other arteries in the body.......

> Perhaps Linus Pauling was correct in his explanation of what causes the

> arteries to be blocked near the heart.....

> Regards

> Jorge

>

[Guest guest]

I disagree that blockages are concentrated around the heart. It is that the

heart being vital for life, the effect of the blockages is noticed earlier

and more frequently than in other sites. Also the awareness of heart disease

scores above the others.

Dr.sibia

-

" Jorge Roshkov " <jroshkov

 

Friday, October 07, 2005 5:03 PM

Re: Re: 2005 - Deaths Linked to Heart Drugs

 

 

Kat, has anyone ever explained why the blockages seem to be concentrated

around the heart - there are many other arteries in the body.......

Perhaps Linus Pauling was correct in his explanation of what causes the

arteries to be blocked near the heart.....

Regards

Jorge

 

 

 

 

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[Guest guest]

Hey Doc, keen to learn more info.

Can you inform where else in the body blockages occur/have occured with dire

results - DVT aside....

If you have read any of Dr Pauling's work, it seems to make a lot of sense,

and the results that he has documented bear scrutiny and follow-up by his

fellow-medicos, instead of pushing the old barrow of " DRUG OR KNIFE " as

the only alternatives.

Perhaps it is as simple as Vitamin C deficiency, and dehydration due to the

adulterated liquids we nowadays intake....?

Regards

Jorge