Let me put it this way. For years, my doctor handed me a prescription for Lipitor every time I saw him, which I never bothered to fill. And for years, I smoked, was diabetic, but successfully controlled my blood sugar by diet and riding my bike 20 miles every day. This past June, I had to stop riding my bike and call a friend for a ride home because the pain in my chest, while riding, was too great to even consider turning around and riding home.
An EKG, stress test, cardiac catheterization, angioplasty, and two stents later, the side effects of NOT taking a statin trump all to hell all of the thus-far nonexistent side effects you're trying to scare me with of taking a statin.
Furthermore, I've been through cardiac rehab. I know what the survivors of heart attacks and bypass surgeries look like. That is a fate to be avoided.
Rail all you want on the evils of statins - that is your right - I have no doubt that the side effects hit some people in very significant ways. However, if you deter even one person from taking medicine which would have headed off a future heart attack, well, consider that side effect.
I took Lipitor for 3 months 8 years ago and came down with Peripheral Neuropathy which has all but ruined my life since that time.
there are alternatives to Statins.