Statins for Kids?!?
Heart Association Recommends Statins for Kids with High Cholesterol
From the AHA comes this little gem:
When diet and exercise fail to lower cholesterol in children with high-risk lipid abnormalities, statins should be first-line drug therapy, declared the American Heart Association in a new scientific statement.
Yes, statins. For kids. I guess the pharmaceutical companies have turned enough adults into pill-popping zombies for life and are now turning their attention to kids over the age of 10. That's one way to make sure you have a customer for life. Why go for 65 year old folks with only 10-20 years to live when you can get a 12 year old with 60 years to live?
Note that this is treatment for high cholesterol, which hasn't been proven to be the dangerous element in heart disease. What would I recommend to ensure today's kids stay happy, healthy, and heart disease-free? Exercise, something that kids used to enjoy, and a diet based on food, rather than on food products: meat; vegetables; nuts; olive, coconut, and palm oils; fruits; sweet potatoes; and squashes. Exercise doesn't have to be weight lifting at a gym; just send them outside to shoot hoops or play tag or kick a rock like kids do. Don't let them eat bags of chips and drink soft drinks all day long just so they'll like you. Parents are responsible for doing what is in their children's best interests, not for being their children's friends. And believe me, as a child of a mother that ensured her children ate plenty of good stuff and only enough bad stuff to keep us normal, they will appreciate it one day. No child is going to grow up and say "Boy, I wish mom had let me drink more Cokes and eat a few more Swiss Cake Rolls."
And let's not forget the real killer: high blood sugar. So we have overweight kids feeding on sugar all day and we're treating them for cholesterol. Hah! It's a sad day in America when our doctors focus on drugs to treat kids rather than on letting kids maintain their health in the normal ways that kids do. I'm surprised they didn't advise a "healthful" low-fat diet too.
