There is quite a lot of media coverage of an alleged error in an article in the British Medical Journal which apparently contained a statistical mistake about the effectiveness and risks of blanket prescription of statins for everybody over, I believe, forty. This is what happened to me.
I was prescribed statins when my cholesterol level was marginally high. I have a genetic liver condition called Gilbert’s Syndrome which makes the liver work a little differently but is not considered to have clinical significance. After a month on the statins I became ill with vomiting and difficulty in digesting food. The statins were stopped but it took two years before I could eat a meal in the evening and all meals had to be reduced, resulting in major weight loss, without having previously been overweight.
I am now fully recovered and by adjusting my diet my cholesterol readings are well within normal for my age. Cholesterol should be dealt with by diet and only if that fails, or there are other reasons for the problem, should statins be prescribed. Blanket feeding of these pills to the population is ridiculous. It is like giving people a pill to combat heavy drinking when the true medical solution is to cut down alcohol intake.
Drug based medical treatment should be a last resort, not a first call. Too many doctors see themselves, or are required to see themselves, as super pharmacists. They need to get back to being medical practitioners. It is a different thing altogether.