Pharmalot: New Insights on Low LDL and Cancer Incidence

You'll recall that Vytorin's SEAS trial raised the spectre of elevated cancer incidence rates being associated with Vytorin's cholesterol lowering "therapy". You'll also recall that Schering's experts were, in the view of many independent observers (Dr. Roy Poses among them) astonishingly cavalier in their high-handed, and essentially instantly-appearing dismissals of any cause-effect link between the two.

If you are a regular reader, you may also recall that PM, over at Gooznews, recently posited an fascinating "mechanism of action" theory to explain these elevated cancer incidence observances -- a mechanism that involves plant sterols.

This morning, Ed Silverman at Pharmalot fills-in a new, and important piece of this complex puzzle. Do go read it all, but I found this snippet to be pretty interesting, if oblique, support for PM's emerging plant sterols theory:

. . . .“While statin treatment in itself appears not to increase the risk of cancer, the issue of a possible link between very low LDL-C levels and cancer has not been fully resolved,” they wrote. “Given the importance of the topic, it is paramount that the Food and Drug Administration and the pharmaceutical industry promptly analyze and report the cancer incidence in the various trials”. . . .

[Emphasis supplied.]

Now recall that Vytorin's mantra has long been that "lower is always better", when it comes to LDL levels.

It may be time to debunk [KUDOS go to the Insider, at PharmaGossip!] that sound-bite. Actually, Drs. Anthony DeMaria, editor-in-chief of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, and Ori Ben-Yehuda, of the University of California, San Diego Medical Center, seem to have just done so.