Posted on 10/30/2007 8:07:22 AM PDT by qam1
Use of cholesterol and blood pressure medicines by young adults appears to be rising rapidly — at a faster pace than among senior citizens, according to an industry report being released Tuesday.
Experts point to higher rates of obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol problems among young people. Also, doctors are getting more aggressive with preventive treatments.
"This is good news, that more people in this age range are taking these medicines," said Dr. Daniel W. Jones, president of the American Heart Association.
Still, he said many more people should be on the drugs that lower cholesterol or blood pressure and which have been shown to reduce risks for heart attack and stroke.
The new data, from prescription benefit manager Medco Health Solutions Inc., indicate use of cholesterol-lowering drugs among people aged 20 to 44, while still low, jumped 68 percent over a six-year period.
The rate rose from 2.5 percent in 2001 to just over 4 percent in 2006 among Medco customers. That means roughly 4.2 million Americans in that age group are now taking cholesterol medicines.
Meanwhile, use of blood pressure medicines increased 21 percent, from about 7 percent of 20- to 44-year-olds in 2001 to over 8 percent in 2006. That translates into about 8.5 million Americans in that age group taking drugs to lower their blood pressure.
"It was a surprise to us," said Dr. Robert Epstein, chief medical officer at Franklin Lakes, N.J.-based Medco. "Maybe the fact that we're seeing more young people with high cholesterol and blood pressure is indicative of the epidemic of obesity and overweight that we're seeing in this country."....
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I blame Florence Henderson. She gave the parents of these youngsters a Wesson Oil fetish that they never shook.
So it’s “good news” that more and more adults are taking anti-cholesterol drugs?
Check this out:
http://www.oralchelation.net/heartdisease/ChapterFive/page5g.htm
Ping list for the discussion of the politics and social (and sometimes nostalgic) aspects that directly effects Generation Reagan / Generation-X (Those born from 1965-1981) including all the spending previous generations are doing that Gen-X and Y will end up paying for.
Freep mail me to be added or dropped. See my home page for details and previous articles.
watch out for Statin Drugs.....they can cause more harm than good.
More consequences of the fast-food, drive-thru, on-demand lifestyle that’s increasing daily.
I think the whole high cholesterol scare is a hoax. I know too many very healthy and active people who report high cholesterol to believe it is really some sort of health crisis. If you’re fat, out of shape, and don’t eat right chances are you’re going to get sick. Cholesterol schlmesterol.
My cholesterol was a little elevated, and my GP whipped out his Rx pad to write a Rx for a statin. “Not so fast,” I told him. I made a few changes to my diet, upped my fish oil and flax seed intake, and the cholesterol came down to normal in a few months.
Everybody is “sick.” Who benefits?
Bingo!
People are just to damn lazy to eat right & exercise and want a pill to make it all better.
“More consequences of the fast-food, drive-thru, on-demand lifestyle that’s increasing daily.”
I’d be more inclined to believe it’s the, “sit on my butt and play video games, download iTunes, chat on MySpace and avoid physical activity at all costs” lifestyle.
thanks for link.
Somehow homo sapiens has made it for at least 100,000 years without cholesterol drugs.
IMO this is just as insane as giving children Ritalin.
To get your cholesterol down where some doctors want it, you have to take statins. The human body cannot get the cholesterol down that low. I stopped taking the statins because they made me feel like I had the flu all the time. Statins can kill you......why else do they have to check your blood all the time? New reports are coming out showing that cholesterol does not cause heart attacks. Really look into this before taking statins.
More young adults ought to be eating oatmeal for breakfast!
I have high cholesteral but don’t take medicine for it. Don’t want to. I work out a lot and am in good shape. I had a doctor tell me I’d have to eat nothing but carrots to lower my cholesteral even a little bit. It’s just inherited. My grandmother just died at 97 and had cholesteral over 500.
The funny thing is when I tried to get personal training throught the Y they asked me some medical questions. One was if I had high cholesteral. I should have lied because they refused to train me because of it. Ridiculous.
My grandfather ate biscuits, grits, and “strick-o-lean” every day of his life. He had a heart attack.....at age 90!
I think he considered it a blessing because he and my grandmother lived in their own house instead of a nursing home and he died without ever being an invalid or having to depend on others for his care.
Not me, no way. My cholesterol topped out at 200 back in 2001 and I’ve lowered it, naturally, to well under 150. I simply changed my diet, drastically reduced my fast food/fried food intake, and started eating oatmeal every morning.
Don’t worry, they can put you on something to treat those side effects.
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