Page 69 - Winter2017

All Thumbs Book Reviews

$tatin Nation: The Ill-Founded War on who had all five.” He continues a few pages later,
Cholesterol, What Really Causes Heart “So-called bad cholesterol is actually lower in
Disease, and the Truth about the Most people with heart disease, not higher.” This at-
Overprescribed Drugs in the World tack on heart disease research will take center
By Justin Smith stage in a few chapters, but here, it is just a teaser
Chelsea Green Publishing of good things to come.
The third and fourth chapters are the heart
If you are reading Wise Traditions, you are of the book. Chapter Three explores the shady
probably familiar with the history, debates and world that is the pharmaceutical industry, with
issues surrounding saturated fat, cholesterol, all its disease-mongering, drug-pushing and
heart disease, stroke and statins. Indeed, most back-door dealing. Smith explains that many
likely you may know more than many doctors drug companies now spend more on marketing
and health care providers do about these things. than on research and development! Further,
Justin Smith’s $tatin Nation may not provide companies target most of their marketing at
too much new information, but it does provide health professionals, rather than consumers
a concise, comprehensive and convenient format (which amazes me, given the constant barrage
for reviewing many, if not all, of the most impor- of pharma commercials that appears on nightly
tant issues at play. It does so in a comprehensible television these days). This “educational” mar-
and clear manner, making the book an excellent keting then shapes how doctors approach their
option to recommend to those wanting to learn patients and their patients’ problems. Ever won-
more about statins. der why modern medicine involves little more
In the preface, Smith starts off on the right than the following? “Hi. What’s wrong? Let me
foot and doesn’t look back for the rest of the look at this drug industry-written book and give
work. He says, “What I learned was that much you drug X, maybe Y and possibly Z for that.”
of what we are told about healthy eating is This is how medicine and the pharmaceutical The decision
wrong….It became obvious that what we think industry train, condition and reward doctors.
about a wide range of health issues is determined Smith notes that the incestuous pharma- to lower the
by commercial interests and experts who are medicine relationship goes even further. The definition
more interested in preserving their own careers decision to lower the definition of “high cho- of “high
than in properly informing the public.” This lesterol” from 250 to 200 was reached by a
statement serves as a summary of what much panel of nine doctors, eight of whom had ties cholesterol”
of the book is about—showing how neither to pharmaceutical companies that manufacture was reached
researchers nor sources of health advice are statins. These ties can range from reimburse- by a panel of
shooting straight with those who suffer under ments for professional trips, drug samples, food
their biased and incorrect recommendations and drinks provided in the workplace, payments nine doctors,
about food and pharmaceuticals. for consulting and speaking engagements and eight of
The first chapter explores the causes of heart much more. Learning about these industry in- whom had
disease. It is full of excellent, short observations centives is enough to raise your blood pressure
that undermine the saturated fat-cholesterol to dangerous levels, so reader beware! ties to
model of heart disease. Smith points out that Chapter Four delves into statin science, companies
the “greatest risk of death was associated with exploring the host of studies that medicine often that
having no risk factors [for heart disease]; people uses to justify America’s most prescribed drug.
with none of the five risk factors were 1.5 times This picks up where Chapter Three ended, with manufacture
more likely to die after a heart attack than people its exposé of how drug companies actually pay statins.

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