I just read an article in the New York Times that I have to share. It says that doctors have discovered two women with a genetic mutation that gives them "dazzlingly low LDL levels."

apparently this discovery is seen by the drug companies as being bigger than curing cancer, and it has set off one of the greatest medical chases ever.

Three pharmaceutical companies, Amgen, Pfizer and Sanofi, are in a race to test and win approval for a drug that mimics the effects of the mutation, drives LDL levels to new lows and prevents heart attacks.

All three companies have drugs in clinical trials and report that their results, so far, are exciting.

Quote:

“This is our top priority,” said Dr. Andrew Plump, the head of translational medicine at Sanofi. “Nothing else we are doing has the same public health impact.”
Dr. Gary H. Gibbons, the director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, estimates that even if the drugs were expensive and injected as many as two million Americans might be candidates. But if they could eventually be made affordable and in pill form — two very big ifs — they might be used by one in four adults, he said.
Despite major gains over the past half-century, heart disease remains the leading killer of Americans, causing nearly 600,000 deaths a year. Statins, the cholesterol-lowering drugs that went on the market in 1987, were a huge breakthrough, but far from a panacea.


The actual article is rather long but quite fascinating. Click the link if you'd like to read it.

Meanwhile, I'm curious as to what you think of this? I take a cholesterol lowering drug which seems to be pretty effective and -- given good prescription drug coverage by my insurance -- is quite affordable. How much would you pay to be assured not to get heart disease, the #1 killer of women?
_________________________
Boomer in Chief of Boomer Women Speak and the National Association of Baby Boomer Women.
www.nabbw.com
www.boomerwomenspeak.com
www.boomerlifestyle.com
www.boomerco.com