Can diet and exercise ever replace statins?
Inside Health
BBC
4.4 • 575 Ratings
🗓️ 6 August 2024
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The inventor of statins, Akira Endo, died this summer. When he was prescribed statins in older age for high cholesterol he refused, preferring to improve his diet and lifestyle instead. But how far can changes like these really go to reduce our bad cholesterol and our overall risk of cardiovascular disease? Our resident GP Margaret McCartney and Professor of Cardiometabolic Medicine Naveed Sattar discuss.
Dermatologist Dr Alexandra Banner gives us the lowdown on how to treat sunburn, including reviewing some of your surprising home remedies.
And what is snus and does it enhance sporting performance? Professor Toby Mundel explains.
Presenter: James Gallagher Producers: Hannah Robins and Tom Bonnett Assistant producer: Katie Tomsett Editor: Holly Squire
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, you're about to listen to a BBC podcast, and I'm Ed Gamble, host of another BBC podcast, |
| 0:05.4 | The Traitors Uncloaked. But my show is available only on BBC Sounds, just like Ellis and John's |
| 0:10.6 | Saturday bonus episodes, the Pop Top Ten podcast with Scott Mills and Ryland, and comedy specials |
| 0:16.2 | from the likes of Harriet Kemsley, Susie Ruffel and Rommas Shranger Nathan. However, and maybe I'm biased, it's really all about the traitors uncloked. |
| 0:24.3 | So for a whole bunch of exclusive scoops and podcasts, listen only on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:30.5 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:34.1 | Hello there and welcome to the Inside Health podcast. I'm James Gallagher. We're going to talk |
| 0:38.7 | about statins this week because over the summer, the scientists that developed them, Akira Endo, |
| 0:44.3 | died. And the obituaries to him are fascinating charting, how he was inspired by the discovery |
| 0:50.8 | of penicillin and turned to moulds and mushrooms to find potential compounds. |
| 0:56.3 | But eventually for him, the story came full circle. |
| 0:59.7 | So he was talking to his doctors about his blood test results and endo had high cholesterol. |
| 1:04.8 | And he was offered a statin. |
| 1:06.9 | And this is where it gets really interesting. |
| 1:09.6 | So he refused to take it initially. |
| 1:11.6 | So he quoted this Japanese proverb going, the indigo dyer wears white trousers and said, no, |
| 1:18.4 | I'm going to do diet and exercise to lower my cholesterol levels. |
| 1:22.2 | So we're going to see in a minute how easy that is to do. |
| 1:25.4 | And then later on inside health, well, with the Olympics |
| 1:28.6 | underway in Paris, we're on the lookout for powdered tobacco. It's known as snooce, and we're |
| 1:33.9 | seeing if it's secretly a performance-enhancing drug. And just in case you get caught out |
| 1:39.5 | in the summer weather, we're going to have the top tips for dealing with sunburn too. But first, can a health |
... |
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