Statins Lower Testosterone Levels in Men

February 09, 2015Statins Lower Testosterone Levels in Men Reference: Endokrnyologia Polska Dec 2014 Statins are the number one drug prescribed in the world.   The power of big pharma to influence policy has led to suggestions that we put statins in the water, such is the enthusiasm of their advocates.   Their utility has been “magnified” and exaggerated by the confusion of the general public, and doctors between relative and absolute risk.   Example, if your risk of death from a heart attack is 2.3%, and it gets lowered to 1.9% if 100 people take the drug for 5 years, it sounds like a 30% reduction instead of a 1.4% reduction.   When you say 30%, it sounds impressive. Given that, a full exploration of some of the real long term damage done by statins has not been rigorously pursued.   That is curious because the statins are, in fact, a blunt instrument. They block the production of cholesterol. Cholesterol is the entry point for most of the important hormones in your body:   estrogen, progesterone, cortisol, DHEA, the mineralocorticoids and testosterone. That’s quite a portfolio of hormones that are being block.   Well, are they blocked? The answer is YES! This article is nicely done. It looked at a population of 237 men and examined the effect of statins on those already taking them, versus not.   The total T was 14.9 vs. 16.35 nmol/L, free testosterone 32 vs. 39 pmol/L, and bioavailable T 32 vs. 39 pmol/L in age matched controls, with controls for body weight.   The P values (statistical significance) reached over 0.01 in all measures.   This should be alarming. Statins lower your testosterone.   There goes muscle strength, immune function, libido, brain vitality, bone health…..and all the myriad beneficial functions of statins. I’m going to reiterate my interpretation of what your blood cholesterol represents.   You can keep your testosterone and lower your cholesterol in just a few weeks. It’s simple.   The LDLs in your blood represent your body’s inability to process and burn the carbohydrates you are ingesting. You are eating too many “high glycemic” foods from potatoes and rice, to bread and anything made from flour or corn. The carbohydrates spill over and turn on insulin.   Insulin instructs your liver to make fat, which it obediently does. Your liver can’t store much of that fat, though it tries. The rest it puts into little transport packages to move the fat cells. You have to do the moving in your blood.   The LDLs in your blood represent just that, eating too many high glycemic carbs. That’s what we call those little transport packages: LDLs.   So, it’s eating carbs that raise your blood fats, and in not eating them that you lower them. Fat is insulin neutral. You can have all the fat you want and it won’t affect the dangerous small LDLs that cause cardiac disease.   It’s those LDLs that are in turn “glycated” by your high blood glucose floating around.   Those glycated LDLs are the real trouble-makers. Your immune system thinks they look like bacteria invading your blood stream and put out a torrent of immune markers to mobilize the white cells to kill off those invading bacteria. (All natural bacteria have sugar markers on their surface.   The immune receptors that line your blood vessels can’t tell the difference between an LDL glycated by your eating too many carbs, and an invading streptococcus.   Now, you have glycation and inflammation running amuck. But the cause was eating too many carbs.   You don’t have a statin deficiency, you have a carb super-sufficiency. www. What will work for me.   Seeing as just about every male in America has lower testosterone as a consequence of all the “xeno-estrogens”, we don’t need yet another challenge. Taking a statin makes sense only if you can’t push away the next donut, bagel, baked potato, cookie or sundae. Want to prove it for yourself? Stop by and let us draw your blood and conduct a two week experiment of no carbs. Measure again and we will prove to you the truth of this column. And then, keep your own testosterone. Voila!   Pop Quiz  
  1. Testosterone is a hormone your body manufactures from cholesterol? T or F
  1. The statin class of drugs inhibits the production of all cholesterol? T or F
  1. This paper showing that statins reduce testosterone should not be a surprise. T or F
  1. You should take a statin if you can’t change your life style of eating lots of carbohydrates.   T or F
True, if 1.4% change in risk for heart disease scares you silly.
  1. Most men in America already have lower testosterone than 50 years ago? T or F