High cholesterol associated with longer life!

Highly educated “experts” rule today’s advanced societies, but their advice on how the rest of us should live – often enforced by government coercion –is increasingly exposed as premature at best and mistaken, incomplete, ignorant, or fraudulent at worst.

Yet another bit of diet advice from “experts” is turning out to be an exploding cigar. High cholesterol particularly LDL cholesterol has been demonized for allegedly bringing on heart attack deaths. But an intriguing analysis of data published in Medium.com seems to show that total mortality is enhanced by high cholesterol levels, even LDL cholesterol. As author P.D. Mangan writes:

… from a public health standpoint, it seems a mistake to focus on changing something that lowers the risk of death from one cause only to raise that risk from another.

Here is one of the key charts showing that people with high cholesterol levels live longer than those with low levels. This one is from Japan:

And one from Finland:

There are a number of possible explanations for the data:

Cholesterol may protect against infections and atherosclerosis.3

Cholesterol may protect against cancer.4

A strong association was found between low cholesterol and violence. Odds ratio of violence for cholesterol of <180 mg/dl was 15.49. 5

Several studies have found an association between low cholesterol and suicide. For instance, one study found that those in the lowest quartile (fourth) of cholesterol concentration had more than 6 times the risk of suicide as those in the highest quartile.6

Has anyone experienced this? You go on a sushi binge, where you eat sushi, like two days in a row...no rice, just sashimi...raw fish.

Then you go home that night, and you get this unbelievable craving for fat...and so you end up eating a bowl of cereal and milk, a peanut butter sandwich, or you might even stop and order a Wendy’s on the way home.

You put Americans on a low fat diet, without meat fat, and you get almost psychotic...

I don’t know if I’m buying this “new” science. My cardiologist still seems to think my cholesterol numbers matter almost than any other data points from the blood tests I have done.

I had a history of high cholesterol. After several episodes of chest pain and shortness of breath over a number of years, I was finally diagnosed with 3 plugged arteries in 2009. I had 3 stents installed.

Now I take Crestor (statin) and Lovaza (fish oil) to keep my numbers in the desired range. Cholesterol and triglycerides are now almost as good as can be.

There are many inputs that go into a healthy lifestyle and so focusing on one input only is not giving the whole picture.

Most people don't realize that in the absence of dietary cholesterol, your body will produce cholesterol - and not necessarily the good kind. So avoiding it in your diet is rather pointless. Like I said, there are many other elements that contribute to a healthy lifestyle so I don't understand all the focus on one's cholesterol number.

I eat fried eggs (in butter) pretty much every morning. On weekends, I add bacon and sausage. I eat healthy amounts of other foods that are said to be high in cholesterol such as liver, cheese and shellfish. My blood work is just fine and my cholesterol level has hovered in the 190-210 range for years and years.

There are many other things I do that are beneficial to my overall health but I certainly don't "watch" or worry about my cholesterol.

There are so many variables that it’s impossible to have a blanket approach for everyone. There are different types of LDL, attached to one type of LDL is lp(a), and high levels of that (inherited from parents) is quite dangerous.

At 45 I am the only person in my biological family who hasn’t had a heart attack. Sadly, my younger brother passed away from one two weeks ago. My doctors have been dismissing my concerns regarding lp(a) because I “look perfect on paper “ for years, but I know I have a 50/50 chance of elevated lp(a). The ME stressed that if my brother had any siblings or children they need to see a cardiologist. I’m so very sad that it took his death for me to be taken seriously. Sadder still is that despite knowing our family history, he didn’t take it seriously himself.

Life is just a spin of the wheel so just enjoy it while you can

There ya go.

While I don't do anything directly bad in my eating habits, I certainly don't do all the silly "counts" and "charts" and all the other stuff.

My father died at age 85, natural causes...meaning he just wore it out.

His cholesterol count was measured in the 400 range as early as 20 years prior to his death.

His personal physician was apoplectic and always prescribing all kinds of cholesterol drugs...which Pop would not take and continued to eat any damned thing he wanted to eat...heavy on the red meat and eggs.

No one in my family, both sides, have died a natural death before the age of 82, with a few living well in the century mark...at least eight that I know of.

And none of them ever worried about cholesterol.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.