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Statin Drug Pain Warning From the Pain Research Institute May 11, 2006 Newsletter from Darrell Stoddard and the Pain Research Institute Pain Medicine More Deadly than War
Since publishing our book Pain Free for Life, in which we warned about the harmful effects of pain medications, David Graham of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration estimated that one drug, Vioxx, killed between 27,000 and 55,000 Americans. That is 12 to 27 times as many lives as the number of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq. And this doesn’t include a comparable number of deaths caused by other pain medications. Western Medicine Does Two Things that are Profoundly and Totally Wrong. The first is: Suppressing pain with pain medications that are all harmful and have deadly side effects, instead of correcting the cause of pain (the subject of our book PainFree for Life). The second thing Western medicine does that is profoundly and totally wrong is: Suppressing cholesterol in the blood with statin drugs to prevent heart disease. Because of the second practice, we are sending the following warning regarding “pain” caused by cholesterol lowering statin drugs: Pain From Cholesterol Lowering Drugs All cholesterol lowering drugs: Lipitor (Atorvastatin), Zocor (Simvistatin), Pravachol (Pravastatiin), Lescol (Fluvastatin). Mevacor Lovastatin), Vytorin (Simvistatin and Ezetimibe), Crestor (Rosuvastatin), Advicor (Lovastatin and Niacin), Zeta (Ezetimibe) These drugs include warnings about what they say is a rare but serious side effect of muscle pain and weakness caused by the drugs. What the ads don’t tell you is that the muscle pain and weakness could be a potentially fatal disease called Rhabdomyolysis which is muscle failure, then kidney failure, and even death (caused by muscle breakdown and not enough cholesterol). Pharmaceutical companies claim this is a “rare” side effect, but because most cases go unreported, it is not rare. One study found that as many as 90% of people taking statin drugs experience some kind of muscle weakness or pain. The statin drug Baycol has already been pulled from the market because of the number of deaths it caused. In the past two years, I have personally witnessed three deaths from taking statin drugs in 138 residents of an assisted living center. All were unreported. I believe it is only a matter of time before all statin drugs will be pulled from the market because of the deaths they cause. Meanwhile, in the misguided war against cholesterol, there are billions of dollars to be made – 26 billion dollars last year alone for cholesterol lowering drugs. In our pain research, we have found two major limiting factors in resolving chronic pain. They are: dehydration, and drugs that only mask the pain. Now we must add a third limiting factor and pain warning: Pain that is caused by muscle failure from taking cholesterol lowering drugs. If you experience muscle weakness or pain while taking a cholesterol lowering drug, medication, herb, or natural product, including red rice yeast extract, (natures statin drug), and Tocotrienol (a form of vitamin E), you should report the pain or weakness to your doctor. Stopping the medication could save your life. Janet Woodcock, M.D. (Director, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration) states the following: “Doctors and the public must be warned to immediately discontinue use of statin drugs at the onset of muscle pain, muscle tenderness, muscle weakness or tiredness. Renal damage due to myoglobinuria (a pigment resulting from massive breakdown of muscle) as a result of rhabdomyolysis is potentially fatal. Prompt cessation of the use of statins at the first sign of muscle pain, muscle tenderness, muscle weakness or tiredness and prompt evaluation by a physician including a blood test for creatine phosphokinase (a measure of muscle destruction) may avoid the progression to more extensive muscle damage, rhabdomyolysis, and death.” See: (http://www.citizen.org/publica Thank God for Cholesterol It is an indisputable fact that life cannot exist without cholesterol. The cell is the structural and functional unit of all living organisms, and cholesterol is a vital component of the membrane of every cell. All the cells in every human on earth require cholesterol to exist and divide. I challenge any doctor, any physiologist, any anatomist, and any scientist in the world to dispute the above biological fact. How can anything be bad when our very life and the life of every cell in our body depend on it? We should “Thank God for cholesterol” because we cannot live without it. Yes, high density lipoproteins, the so called “good cholesterol” is better than low density lipoproteins, but no cholesterol is bad! One writer said that reducing cholesterol to prevent heart disease is like trying to prevent Alzheimer’s disease by taking out the brain. It makes perfect sense. People with no brains do not have Alzheimer’s disease, and people with no cholesterol, have zero heart disease, because they are dead! George Mann, M.D. a principle investigator of the Framingham Study believed the cholesterol/lipid hypothesis of heart disease was "the public health diversion of this century . . . the greatest scam in the history of medicine." Does cholesterol that collects as “plaques” on the inside of arteries lead to heart attacks? The answer is an unqualified YES. Because everyone has cholesterol in their blood, no matter how much or how little cholesterol they consume, this can happen to anyone. The liver will produce cholesterol, no matter how little we eat, just to sustain life. You are dead without it. I know personally that anyone can have a heart attack. Our 44 year old son died two years ago today from a heart attack (myocardial infarction) when he was jogging. Cholesterol plaques formed on the inside of his arteries; a blood clot completely blocked a vital artery in his heart, leading to his death. He never smoked, or used tea, coffee, or alcohol. He exercised regularly. He did not have high blood cholesterol levels and his diet was not high in saturated fat. When evidence is presented to show the reduction of heart disease through giving cholesterol lowering drugs, it is because the drugs are also anti-inflammatory. There are almost no studies showing statin drugs help women of any age and no studies showing they help older people of either sex. Only men under 50 who are at high risk of having a heart attack seem to be helped. The question is why does cholesterol collect on the inside of arteries? It does so to heal injuries and inflammation. The answer is to prevent the injury or inflammation, not reduce the cholesterol the liver produces to heal the injury or inflammation. There are much better ways to reduce injury and inflammation in the arteries. This will be the subject of our next E-mail. Harmful Side Effects of Statin Drugs Loss of mental function and memory are common side effects of cholesterol lowering drugs the pharmaceutical companies don’t want you or your doctor to know. The brain must have cholesterol for all of its control functions and thought processes. Two reports in the medical literature, document cognitive impairment in 100% of statin users if sufficiently sensitive testing is done. Suicide, depression, irritability, hostility, constipation, peripheral neuropathy, loss of libido, impotence, and 123 more adverse side effects are listed for statin drug usage. Such disabilities may remain after the drugs have been discontinued and may even be permanent. Healing from any injury or surgery is compromised when people take cholesterol lowering drugs. It is no secret that more people die on the operating table from the anesthesia than they do from the condition requiring the surgery. A beloved friend who was on Lipitor died on the operating table during open heart surgery. I believe he might have survived if his cholesterol levels had been higher. If surgeons understood the necessity of cholesterol for cellular division (to replace damaged cells), they would never perform surgery on anyone who was taking a statin drug. It has now been recommended that all diabetics be placed on cholesterol lowering drugs, no matter what their cholesterol levels are. This seems especially dangerous when statin drugs may cause liver damage and kidney failure that many diabetics experience without taking the drugs. Statin Drugs and Cancer Studies have shown small but not statistically significant increases in the incidence of cancer in people on statin drugs. This could be expected because most cancers take years to develop and statin drugs haven’t been used long enough for slow developing cancers to appear. In time they will. Breast cancer and non-melanoma skin cancers are the exception. There is evidence that statin drugs increase the incidence of breast cancer. In a cholesterol study called the CARE trial, 12 women developed breast cancer that were on cholesterol lowering drugs and only one woman developed breast cancer in the control group. A meta-analysis of all clinical statin trials found no overall increase in cancer. However, in that analysis rapidly developing non-melanoma skin cancer was excluded. This is a flagrant manipulation of data to hide the harmful effects of statin drugs. Animal studies have found that statin drugs increase all types of cancer. This is because animals have shorter life spans and it takes less time for cancer to develop. Regarding cancer and statins see: http://www.thincs.org/unpublic High Cholesterol May Even Help You to Live Longer I quote directly from an article by Uffe Ravnskov, MD, PhD: “People with high cholesterol live the longest. This statement seems so incredible that it takes a long time to clear one’s brainwashed mind to fully understand its importance. Yet the fact that people with high cholesterol live the longest emerges clearly from many scientific papers. Consider the finding of Dr. Harlan Krumholz of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at Yale University, who reported in 1994 that old people with low cholesterol died twice as often from a heart attack as did old people with a high cholesterol…..it is actually much better to have high than to have low cholesterol if you want to live to be very old.” A UCLA Department of Medicine and Cardiomyopathy study of more than a thousand patients found that after five years 62 percent of the patients with cholesterol below 129 mg/l had died, but only half as many of the patients with cholesterol above 223 mg/l. See: http://www.westonaprice.org “Natural” Health Food Folks are also Misled about Cholesterol There are dozens of “natural” products claiming to lower cholesterol with no side effects. They cannot know “there are no side effects” without research equal to the research for drug approval. This will never happen because such products are not patentable. Tocotrienols (a form of vitamin E) will lower cholesterol probably as much as any statin drug. I know a healthy young doctor who lowered his cholesterol 100 points and a patient that lowered his cholesterol 200 points by taking tocotrienols. I too was brainwashed and thought I should lower my cholesterol with something safe and natural like tocotrienols. My cholesterol came down, but after a period of time, I experienced five of the warning signs of rhabdomyolysis. This I dismissed as just getting older. Then, thank God, I realized the tocotrienols, were causing the same life threatening symptoms as statin drugs. The effects of not enough cholesterol are the same whether you do it with a drug, a natural product, a vitamin, or an herb. Just because it is a natural product, a vitamin, or an herb does not mean it is safe. We must be “wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” Marijuana, tobacco, opium, cocaine, heroin, and morphine are natural products. Deaths from Cholesterol Lowering Drugs Three people close to me are now dead from taking cholesterol lowering drugs. With the brain-washing we (including doctors) have received about cholesterol being bad, I understand why they were given the drugs. What is totally unacceptable is that when muscle weakness and pain began, none of the three were taken off the drugs soon enough to save their lives. One was still on a statin drug the day she died, even though she had completely lost the use of her legs for more than a year! It is tragic to die with a heart attack, but even more tragic to die needlessly from a drug intended to stop heart attacks. You can save lives by forwarding this e-mail to as many people as possible. Darrell Stoddard, Founder – Pain Research Institute http://www.healpain.net I sincerely believe the Pain Research Institute leads the world in understanding the causes and treatment of pain. The scholars cited at the end of this article lead the world in understanding the causes and prevention of heart disease. See their studies for the information presented in this e-mail and to understand how modern medicine could be so totally and profoundly wrong about preventing heart disease with cholesterol lowering drugs. References The Great Cholesterol Scam by Duane Graveline, M.D. at: http://www.spacedoc.net The Oiling of America by Mary Enig, Phd, and Sally Fallon at: http://www.westonaprice.org The Cholesterol Myths by Uffe Ravnskov, M.D., Ph.d. at: http://www.ravnskov.nu/myth1 Cholesterol is NOT the Cause of Heart Disease By Ron Rosedale, M.D. at: http://www.mercola.com/2005 The Dangers of Statin Drugs: What You Haven’t Been Told about Cholesterol-Lowering Medication by Sally Fallon and Mary G. Enig, PhD at: http://www.westonaprice.org A Major Cause of Cancer and Heart Disease Your Doctor, Dentist, or Chiropractor Does Not Want You To Know by Darrell Stoddard at: http://healpain.net/articles Radiation from Medical Procedures in the Pathogenesis of Cancer and Ischemic Heart Disease by John Gofman, M.D., Ph.D. http://www.ratical.org/radiati Heart Revolution: The Extraordinary Discovery That Finally Laid the Cholesterol Myth to Rest and Put Good Food Back on the Table, by Kilmer McCully, MD. Dr. McCully is the doctor who discovered the role of homocysteine in the origin and development of heart disease - one of the most important medical discoveries of the last century. His epoch discovery was ignored for 26 years. Now it is known and accepted by every cardiologist and most medical doctors. Even though the breakthrough homocysteine discovery has been accepted, most doctors are still stuck on the lipid (cholesterol) theory of heart disease evidenced by the fact that an estimated 100 million people may be put on cholesterol lowering drugs. If doctors will take the time to read McCully's book they will realize that cholesterol is a blessing not a curse. The answer to preventing heart disease is lowering homocysteine levels, and lowering inflammation not just lowing cholesterol levels in the blood. See Life Extension Magazine interview with Kilmer McCully at: http://www.lef.org/magazine The Dangers of Low Blood Cholesterol www.secondopinions.co.uk Another related and very informative website: http://www.thincs.org/WAPF2003 Harvard School of Public Health article about Fats and Cholesterol: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu After sending the above it e-mail, we realized that it should have been titled, Harm from Not Enough Cholesterol instead of “Statin Drug Warning.” It is our hypothesis that the liver produces the amount of cholesterol the body needs; first, to sustain all life processes by cellular division, and second, to repair injury and inflammation. If this is true then, should we reduce, by any means, either of these God given functions of the liver and the production of cholesterol that are necessary not only for the life of every cell, but of life itself? When we understand the above purpose of cholesterol, it becomes obvious that cholesterol is a symptom of heart disease not the cause. Mailing List You received this Email because you asked to be on our mailing list. If you received this from a friend and would like to be on our mailing list, send an e-mail with the word “Add” as the subject. Send the word “Remove” if you would like to be removed from our list.
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