2026 Cholesterol Guidelines: Putting numbers over people and science

As the medical community scripts new cholesterol guidelines, the media has compliantly announced that our nation's top scientists, most respected medical agencies, and academic centers want to prevent heart disease by screening for high cholesterol more aggressively and treating cholesterol more aggressively.  The geniuses who created the guidelines want screening and treatment to start even in 10-year-olds!  But there are flaws.  First, no new science is incorporated into the guidelines, and other than drug-company designed observational studies all randomized trials show no value to measuring and fixing cholesterol.  In fact, not only is cholesterol not a prognostic risk factor for heart disease, not only does lowering it not help heart disease, but in people over 60 and in kids/young adults high cholesterol portends better outcomes.  Second, the organizations that printed these guidelines are tainted and self-serving, seeking to push lower cholesterol levels not based on any likelihood of helping people, but solely to sell more drugs, create more office visits, and justify more testing.  The American Heart Association (AHA) is funded and led by drug companies; the American College of Cardiology also has strong ties to drug companies and has as its main objective increasing salaries of cardiologists.  Third, the academic doctors who put their name on these guidelines are a who's who of docs who conduct drug company research, research that pays their institutions.  We know that cholesterol is not worth measuring, especially in kids and elders.  We know that statins come with risks and should be reserved for people with high risk of heart attack and stroke who are over 25 and under 80, but are not helpful in people with high cholesterol.  And we know that pushing LDL cholesterol under 70 is frankly dangerous and medically negligent.  We will explain!"The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism."  -William Osler, MDwww.returntohealing.com