Statins are a class of drugs that are used to lower blood cholesterol levels. Since their introduction in the late 1980s, statins have become some of the most widely prescribed drugs in the world. But an article in a pharmacology journal says that the benefits of statins have been overstated and their adverse effects have been minimized.
Writing in Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology, David M. Diamond of the University of South Florida in Tampa stated that although many studies have touted the efficacy of statins at reducing the risk of heart attacks and strokes, they have failed to account for serious side effects from the drugs.
Some of the studies supporting the use of statins have used what Diamond and his co-authors Uffe Ravnskov called a statistical deception that makes the drugs appear to be more effective than they are. The studies use a statistical tool called relative risk rather than a tool called absolute risk.
When absolute risk is used, it shows that only one person out of 100 people treated with a statin will have one less heart attack. Instead, statin researchers use another relative risk, which creates the appearance that statins will benefit between 30% and 50% of the people taking them. Using relative risk amplifies the beneficial effects of statins.
"Our opinion is that although statins are effective at reducing cholesterol levels, they have failed to substantially improve cardiovascular outcomes," they wrote. The inflated claims for the effectiveness of statins in preventing heart disease, and minimization of the adverse effects, has played a role in the huge popularity among healthcare providers and the public for cholesterol-lowering drugs, they added.
Statin use has frequently been associated with an increased risk of cancer, Diamond and Ravnskov stated. Most clinical trials of statin drugs are only 2 to 5 years long, a period too short to see most cancers develop.
