The ABC recently aired a two-part program on Catalyst entitled The Heart of the Matter. The first program, Dietary Villains, questioned the role of saturated fats in causing high cholesterol and cardiovascular disease, and the second program, Cholesterol Drug War, asked if statins really reduce your risk of heart disease. The result has been consternation among some of Australia's medical community, with the ABC's own health specialist Norman Swan claiming that the Catalyst program could cause people to die if they gave up taking statins on the basis of this program (see the Sydney Morning Herald report on 4 November).
The ABC's Health Report (presented by Norman Swan) made an alternative case in their program this week, The Cholesterol and Statin Debate, which included an interview with Professor Peter Clifton. Another interesting article which attempts to unravel the arguments and includes links to clinical trials and other evidence-based material was published this week in The Conversation by Justin Coleman from Griffith University - Viewing Catalyst's cholesterol programs through the sceptometer . Be sure to scroll down to the comments below where the conversation continues.
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