World Renowned Heart Surgeon Speaks Out On What Really Causes Heart Disease

Dwight C. Lundell, M.D. lost medical license in 2008. Since that time he has been promoting books that clash with established scientific knowledge of heart disease prevention and treatment. His book, The Great Cholesterol Lie, invites people to &quot;forget about everything you have been told about low-fat diets, saturated fats, cholesterol and the causes of heart disease.&quot;<p><a href="http://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/lundell.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.quackwatch.org&#x2F;11Ind&#x2F;lundell.html</a>

This is pure quackery. The cholesterol -&gt; heart disease framework was developed by the Framingham studies (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framingham_Heart_Study" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Framingham_Heart_Study</a>) that showed a strong correlation between cholesterol and heart attacks and strokes. Now correlation does not equal causation but decades of subsequent studies have shown that cardiac event rates drop linearly with decrease in LDL (a form of cholesterol) (<a href="http://www.nature.com/nrcardio/journal/v8/n12/fig_tab/nrcardio.2011.158_F1.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nature.com&#x2F;nrcardio&#x2F;journal&#x2F;v8&#x2F;n12&#x2F;fig_tab&#x2F;nrcard...</a>). It has culminated so far in the JUPITER trial (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JUPITER_trial" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;JUPITER_trial</a>) where people with &quot;normal&quot; LDL levels and no history of heart disease were able to decrease their heart attack risk with statins by driving their LDL even lower. The whole inflammation stuff came into play because JUPITER also looked at an inflammatory marker called CRP. Now, that angle is still controversial but could play a role. However, it does not invalidate the dozens of studies linking cholesterol to heart disease. Plus there is nothing linking this guy&#x27;s quack theories on nutrition to inflammation&#x2F;CRP or ultimately to heart attacks.<p>I&#x27;m surprised that it made it this high on HN. Maybe people just love feeling that &quot;freakanomics&quot; feeling of mental superiority that they&#x27;re willing to swallow any alternative hypothesis that challenges the norm. Maybe people just don&#x27;t trust medical science.

That reads too much like baloney.

Another slam against overconsumption of sugar and processed foods. This guy may not have the best reputation but the advice doesn&#x27;t seem all that bad.

I&#x27;m glad that there will be that 1% or so of people who pick up this article and have it change their minds. :)<p>That dietary cholesterol necessarily causes heart damage is taken as a matter of faith. :(

tl;dr cholesterol is not the problem, things that inflame the arteries, e.g. high processed carbs and over consumption of certain oils

&quot;Well,smokers perhaps, but at least they made that choice willfully.&quot; He knows very little about smoking.

In hindsight I wish I had done more than just read this article before I submitted it.<p>A lesson learnt.