Why are we asking this now?
Statins, the cholesterol-lowering drugs, are known to cut the risk of heart disease and are already prescribed to millions of people at high risk. This week a trial of rosuvastatin, whose brand name is Crestor made by AstraZeneca, was shown to dramatically reduce the risk even in people whose cholesterol level was normal or low.
Researchers had expected a reduction of around 25 per cent but the actual decline in risk among the treated group was almost twice that (47 per cent). The results, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, were so clear that the trial of 18,000 patients in 26 countries was stopped early so that all those on placebo could be offered the drug.
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