Lies, damned lies and, yes we all know what’s next, statistics. Using statistical trickery it appears to have been added to the pharmaceutical companies’ black art of converting healthy people into patients. Of course this isn’t a new trick, they have been using numbers to exaggerate a drug’s benefits for years.
A prime example involves Lipitor. Jon Herring, Health Editor of Early To Rise, puts its succinctly:
In order to promote its use, drug companies and physicians consider the "relative risk reduction" of this drug – and ignore its "absolute risk reduction."
Lipitor promoters insist that those with so-called high cholesterol can achieve a 36% "relative risk reduction" in heart attack by using the cholesterol-lowering drug.
Now that’s an impressive reduction in risk, or at least it sounds like it is. Herring continues:
Meanwhile, that same raw data can yield a more revealing "absolute risk reduction" of a paltry 1%. Absolute risk reduction is a more useful and informative number, because it compares the actual difference between treated and untreated groups of people. Unfortunately, it is not good for increasing sales.
According to Shane Ellison, author of Hidden Truth about Cholesterol-Lowering Drugs, pushing absolute risk reduction under the drug-rug while magnifying relative risk reduction is a dangerous trend in advertising today. Disguised as science, it promotes drug use among healthy populations who are needlessly putting themselves at risk in terms of a drug’s adverse side effects.
This is a serious matter. In the case of Lipitor, the needless adverse side effects include cancer and heart failure. Do you think you really need statins? Search this site for more details, you may just rescue your health in time.
According to market data reported by bloomberg.com, Lipitor is the world’s biggest-selling medicine, generating $11 billion in sales this year.
With so much money at stake, little things like your health won’t get in the way of making profits. With this much money comes power to influence researchers and regulators very easily.
An excellent compilation of information relating to Lipitor and other statins, together with relevant links to useful sources of additional information may be found at Lipitor: Side Effects And Natural Remedy.
Peter
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Dr Peter Tylee
Editor