The Truth about Cholesterol

1. The Truth about Cholesterol

2. One of the most maligned of all nutrients is cholesterol. Even sodium is not so greatly feared.

3. Cholesterol is the most highly-decorated small molecule in biology. Thirteen Nobel Prizes have been awarded to scientists who devoted major parts of their careers to cholesterol.

4. Ever since it was first isolated from gallstones in 1784, cholesterol has exerted an almost hypnotic fascination for scientists from the most diverse areas of science and medicine.

5. Doctors like to blame all cardiovascular problems on cholesterol.

6. Medical doctors are like color-blind art critics when they look at cholesterol.

7. Although there are diseases that can elevate cholesterol or triglycerides, there’s not a single disease caused by elevated blood cholesterol or triglycerides.

8. Most of the cholesterol information that populates through mainstream medical society today is based on faulty research and assumptions that have been passed down and then propagated by drug company propaganda.

9. People with Low cholesterol become just as atherosclerotic as people whose cholesterol is High.

10. Cholesterol is extremely important to the human body—so important that your liver makes it.

11. That’s how Statin drugs work. Statin drugs inflame the liver so it can’t make cholesterol. That’s why if your taking statin drugs, you have to have your liver enzymes checked every six months to make sure the drug isn’t giving you hepatitis.

12. Statin drugs stimulate cancer in rodents, disturb functions of the muscles, the heart and the brain and pregnant women taking Statins may give birth to children with malformations more severe than those seen after thalidomide.

13. All of the insulation that wraps around our nerves (myelin) is made from cholesterol.

14. The building blocks for the manufacture of cholesterol are 2-carbon fragments called acetate, which are hooked end-to-end until 30 of them are chained together.

15. Through many steps involving many different enzyme catalysts, this chain is cyclized, and finally 3 carbons are clipped from different parts, to arrive at the 27 carbon, cholesterol molecule.

16. The 2-carbon acetate fragment come from fats and oils (fatty acids) being broken down for energy, and are broken into 2-carbon fragments. Since the body conserves the essential fatty acids for other vital functions, saturated and monounsaturated fatty acids are the main source of acetate fragments from fats.

17. When carbohydrate (sugars and starches) is broken down for energy, they too produce the 2-carbon fragments.

18. Protein (amino acids) also can be broken down to produce acetate fragments, but the body conserves amino acids for building important structures, so protein is burned for energy only in extreme circumstances such as fasting, some disease states and when inordinately large amounts of protein are consumed.

19. All tissues containing nucleated cells can produce cholesterol and the regulation of cholesterol biosynthesis is very complex.

20. Stage 1–Three molecules of acetyl-CoA combine to form mevalonate.

21. Stage 2–Mevalonate combines with three phosphate groups, loses a carboxyl group and two hydrogen atoms to yield isopentenyl pyrophosphate.

22. Stage 3–Six isopentenyl groups combine, lose their pyrophosphate groups and yield squalene.

23. Stage 4–In a series of enzyme reactions, squalene is cyclized to form lanosterol.

24. Stage 5–Lanosterol, after four biochemical reactions, is converted into cholesterol.

25. This is one of the most complex biochemical processes elucidated to date. The body really goes to an awful lot of trouble to produce cholesterol–the killer!

26. The usual mean cholesterol levels for both sexes is considered to be: AGE CHOLESTEROL 30 - 39 150 - 280 40 - 49 160 - 325 50 - 59 140 - 340

27. A cholesterol level in your blood over 340 mg/dl is a symptom of an underlying nutritional deficiency and/or x-radiation and metal toxicity that damages the arteries, rather than the cause.

28. The daily turnover is about 1100 mg, or just over 1 gram.

29. Anxiety and/or apprehension–like dropping a book–can elevate serum cholesterol 100 points. Fear of cholesterol can do the same.

30. The same enzymes that are involved in the production of cholesterol are also required for the production of an essential compound called coenzyme Q10.

31. Coenzyme Q10–also called ubiquinone–plays an important role in the manufacture of ATP, the fuel that runs cellular processes.

32. Though it is present in every cell in your body, it is especially concentrated in the very active cells of your heart.

33. Depriving the heart of CoQ10 is like removing a spark plug from your engine–it just won’t work.

34. Low levels of CoQ10 are implicated in virtually all cardiovascular diseases, including angina, hypertension, cardiomyopathy and congestive heart failure.

35. Merck knew that statins deplete CoQ10 and knew that this could contribute to heart disease in 1990.

36. In the time that statins have been on the market, the incidence of congestive heart failure has tripled.

37. MDs are making things worse at the same time that they are trying to make things better.

38. Vitamins C and B3 lower blood cholesterol levels, as do the minerals calcium, zinc, chromium and selenium.

39. The essential and other highly unsaturated fatty acids are important.

40. As early as 1858 Virchow, the father of modern pathology, clearly showed that cholesterol does not start the process but that it is the end product of degeneration.

41. The final Framingham reports in 1970 showed no relationship between eating cholesterol and saturated fats and the incidence of heart disease.

42. Far from being a health destroyer, cholesterol is absolutely essential for life.

43. Elevated cholesterol is like a warning signal; like a fever.

44. Cholesterol is a very important substance that makes it possible to transport life-giving soluble substances throughout the body using the water of the blood stream.

45. If you don’t have enough cholesterol, you won’t make enough sex hormones.

46. The body uses over sixty steroids derived from cholesterol for hormones.

47. Cholesterol is the main component of bile acids, which aid in the digestion of foods, particularly fatty foods.

48. Although most people think of it as being “fat in the blood,” only seven percent of the body’s cholesterol is found in the blood.

49. In fact, cholesterol is not really fat at all; it’s a pearly-colored, waxy, solid alcohol that is soapy to the touch.

50. The bulk of the cholesterol in your body, the other 93 percent, is located in every cell of the body, where its unique waxy, soapy consistency provides the cell membranes with their structural integrity and regulates the flow of nutrients into–and waste products out of–the cells.