Low LDL Cholesterol, but Not Statin Use, Associated With an Increased Risk of Cancer

Remember the part where they told us that low LDL (bad cholesterol) is good and high LDL is bad?

"'We found that there is indeed an association, that the lower the LDL cholesterol, the higher the risk of cancer,' senior investigator Dr Richard Karas (Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, MA) told heartwire. 'Despite the LDL-lowering capacity of statins, however, the data are quite reassuring that statins don't increase the risk of cancer.'"

"Quite reassuring."

So why the higher incidence of cancer?

"Commenting on the findings, Steinberg, an advocate of pushing LDL-cholesterol levels to as low 50 mg/dL to prevent cardiovascular disease, agrees with the investigators about the safety of statin therapy, noting that statins had 'nothing to do with' the cancer risk observed with the low levels of LDL cholesterol. Untreated subjects, he points out, had the same 'low-LDL/higher-cancer-risk' relationship as those treated with statins, and the epidemiologic correlation should not be interpreted as a causal connection.

To account for the association between low LDL cholesterol and cancer risk, Steinberg believes this is the 'unsuspected-sickness phenomenon,' with cholesterol levels lowered by subclinical disease. He notes that cancers can significantly lower cholesterol levels almost a decade before they surface clinically. 'The randomly recruited cohorts in the large statin trials undoubtedly included some subjects who had low LDL levels at the time they entered the study because they already had cancer,' writes Steinberg. 'Low LDL is the result, not the cause, of cancer.'"

Who knows?

But whatever it is, it has "nothing to do" with statins and is likely due to the dreaded "unsuspected-sickness phenomenon."

Clearly.

Still trust these folks to find a "cure" for your too-fatness?

If you do, you have the dreaded "suspected-moron phenomenon."