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 - 39150 - 280 40 - 49160 - 325 50 - 59140 - 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.

51. Cells manufacture cholesterol in response to demand. Without cholesterol we would lose the strength and stability of our cells, rendering them much less resistant to invasion by infection and malignancy.

52. In fact, a grave sign of serious illness is a falling cholesterol level. Understanding this should dispel any notion that it is a destroyer of health to be feared and avoided.

53. Besides the cells’ production of cholesterol, the liver, intestines, adrenal glands and sex glands all make cholesterol for the other functions in which cholesterol is involved.

54. During pregnancy, the placenta also makes cholesterol, and from it manufactures progesterone, which keeps the pregnancy from being terminated.

55. So important is cholesterol that the body has maintained its independence from external sources: cholesterol can be synthesized from a variety of important materials.

56. The greater part of cholesterol of the body arises by synthesis (about 1 g/d), whereas only about 0.3 g/d are provided by the average diet.

57. Extra cholesterol is hooked up (esterified) with linoleic acid and shipped off to the liver to be changed into bile acids, provided that the vitamins and minerals necessary for this change are present in a biologically usable form.

58. The bile acids are dumped into the intestine and help there with fat digestion, and are then removed from the body with the wastes in the colon, provided that the food contains sufficient fiber, and that bowel action is regular enough to prevent the bile acids from being reabsorbed and recycled.

59. All tissues containing nucleated cells are capable of synthesizing cholesterol, particularly the liver, adrenal cortex, skin, intestines, testes and aorta.

60. Acetyl-CoA is the source of all the carbon atoms in cholesterol.

61. A diet high in non- essential fatty acids and refined carbohydrate produces an excess of acetate fragments in the body, and thus ‘pressures’ the body into increased cholesterol production.

62. Without cholesterol we could not absorb the essential fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K from the food we eat.

63. Cholesterol is necessary for normal growth and development of the brain and nervous system.

64. In man, the brain and spinal cord make up only 2% of the body weight; still 23% of the cholesterol is in the nervous system.

65. Cholesterol coats the nerves and makes the transmission of nerve impulses possible.

66. Cholesterol gives skin its ability to shed water.

67. Cholesterol is a precursor of vitamin D in the skin. When exposed to sunlight, this precursor molecule is converted to its active form for use in the body.

68. Cholesterol plays a major role in the transportation of triglycerides through the circulatory system.

69. Without it you would die.

70. Although cholesterol consumption has remained about constant during the last 100 years, cardiovascular disease has risen 350% and cancer 600% in the same time period.

71. Cholesterol consumption cannot be the cause of these disorders. Factors which appear to be more closely related to cardiovascular disease than cholesterol levels are consumption of sugar, oil, additives, trans-fatty acids, drugs which lower cholesterol, deficiencies of vitamins, minerals and essential fatty acids.

72. Autopsies consistently show no relationship between the blood cholesterol level and the amount of plaque in the arteries.

73. Dr. Michael DeBakey’s studies showed that 80% of heart patients have normal cholesterol levels.

74. Hypertension (high blood pressure) is the cause of the damage, not cholesterol.

75. Arterial plaques begin as mutations to smooth muscle cells in the artery, which then proliferate, become fibrous, and eventually manufacture their own cholesterol.

76. Arterial plaque contains a complex mixture of cholesterol, calcium, lipoproteins, mutated arterial cells, and fibrin, as a part of the repair process of lesions in the intima (muscle layer) created by high blood pressure, mercury, and x-rays.

77. Hypertension, mercury, and medical x-rays damage the artery and set in motion some of the processes leading to narrowing of artery channels for blood flow and thickening and hardening of the blood vessel walls.

78. Damage to the tissue becomes evident first, and then comes an accumulation of fat, and finally, as the scar tissue is formed, a high content of cholesterol appears.

79. It is part of the healing process of a wound from damage caused by something else.

80. Cholesterol and triglycerides are natural body fats with definite roles to play. They are produced in the liver to serve their functions in the body.

81. In 1998 the American Medical Association held a press conference and told doctors that public concern over elevated cholesterol is not warranted, and in the same year, the AMA also warned that all members of the two most popular classes of lipid-lowering drugs (the fibrins and the statins) cause cancer in rodents, in some cases at levels of animal exposure close to those prescribed to humans.

82. Read any university biochemistry text. If cholesterol metabolism is discussed, in the first three or four paragraphs it will say “The more cholesterol-rich foods eaten, the less cholesterol the body makes.”

83. Because of the involvement of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, the American Heart Association and advertisements of low cholesterol products, practitioners have shown a tendency to ignore the new studies, showing that eating cholesterol does not cause heart disease, and evidence showing that avoiding cholesterol does not prevent heart disease, considering them to be exceptions to the rule.

84. If you have elevated cholesterol and triglycerides, it might be an indication of a weak functioning thyroid gland (hypothyroidism).

85. It could mean you have diabetes.

86. It could mean you have deficiencies of niacin, chromium, and vanadium, or the essential fatty acids.

87. It could mean you have liver disease.

88. There are all kinds of reasons why you might have elevated blood cholesterol and triglycerides.

89. The Eskimos above the Arctic Circle have a traditional diet that’s 98% red meat and blubber.

90. There’s not a single Eskimo above the Arctic Circle that has a Mr. Juiceman juicer and eats organically-grown broccoli.

91. Their average cholesterol ranges from 250 – 350 and their legendary for not getting cardiovascular disease— until they come down to the lower 48 and eat like us…

92. Then when they get the cardiovascular disease and go back, North of the Arctic Circle to die, and they start eating whale blubber again—it goes away!

93. One of the best sources of cholesterol is the lowly chicken egg, the yolk of the egg is loaded with cholesterol—and it is GOOD!

94. Another myth is that there’s Good Cholesterol and Bad Cholesterol. It’s nonsense!

95. Cholesterol is transported through the blood by lipoproteins.

96. HDL – high density lipoproteins – very small size LDL – low density lipoproteins – small size VLDL – very low density lipoprotein – largest size

97. People will tell you that the HDL is GOOD cholesterol and LDL or VLDL is BAD cholesterol More nonsense!

98. There is nothing inherently bad about LDL or good about HDL.

99. Total cholesterol is adding up the HDL, the LDL and triglycerides. No real magic here.

100. LDL doesn’t cause any problems, but an elevated LDL is an indication that oxidative damage, caused by free- radicals, is happening in the body.

101. This means you have to take more antioxidant nutrients and clean up your diet so you’re not eating foods loaded with free-radical formers.

102. If your LDL is elevated, you need to eat more chocolate, take more selenium, take more antioxidant-rich foods into your diet and your LDL will come down.

103. Every MD in the world believes that cholesterol causes arteries to clog up.

104. That’s like thinking that ash causes forest fires!

105. Or that maggots cause garbage,

106. or that mosquitoes cause stagnant water!

107. This is a completely lopsided view of what’s happening.

108. There are two types of clogging in the circulatory system.

109. One is calcium deposition in the arteries (hardening of the arteries). This is caused by a magnesium deficiency.

110. When you have too much calcium relative to magnesium, calcium will precipitate out of solution and deposit in the arteries.

111. The other form is cholesterol deposition. Caused by free- radical damage to the artery wall.

112. If cholesterol were the cause, it would pile up in the veins as well, but it doesn’t.

113. It only happens in the high-pressure arteries where the artery walls start to tear.

114. When you unwittingly eat the wrong foods: oils and fried foods, well-done red meat, nitrates in meats, the skins of baked potatoes, yams and sweet potatoes, your bloodstream is loaded with free-radicals.

115. Free-radicals are like metabolic Velcro. They stick to everything, and what they stick to oxidizes and is destroyed.

116. Free-radicals accumulate at the bends in arteries.

117. This causes oxidative damage to the artery walls and they start to tear from the high pressure.

118. In an attempt to repair the compromised artery, the body lays down a patch that contains cholesterol.

119. Cholesterol is the bandage that’s keeping you alive, it’s not the cause of clogged arteries.