July 7, 2008 
I was a little surprised to see the news this morning claiming that it was okay to start putting kids as young as 8 years old on cholesterol lowering drugs and starting testing as early as 2 years old. Talk about an obesity epidemic out of control. I would think that there were lots of things we could be doing about diet and exercise to address this before setting kids up to be on these maintenance medications for the rest of their life.
Not a clinical opinion, but my personal opinion. It makes me think of the social commentary delivered in the new movie – Wall-e – where the people don’t know how to walk anymore and just float around getting fatter and fatter.
Enabling Healthy Decisions 
This is being read about in the media so much for sensationalism reasons.
Pharma Cos. typically seek a peds indication on any branded med they may have to extend the patent of that med.
No doctor is gonna be putting kids on statins.
How about fortifying breakfast cereal with cholesterol drugs like Lipitor. Seriously though, will this new indication give added patent life to Lipitor? See AAP Guidelines May Help Extend the Patent Life of Lipitor at http://pharmamkting.blogspot.com/2008/07/aap-guidelines-may-help-extend-patent.html
Can’t wait to see what Bill Maher has to say about this.
Reminds me of his rant: “Ask your doctor if getting of your fat a** is right for you”.
Throw away the playstation, the xBox, the Wii, the cupboard of DVDs, the deep fried cheese snacks and get your kids into an activity.
Medication culture is victim culture… aaaaragh. This just boils me up.
Brave New World indeed.
Wow. I’d love to see the evidence justifying these recommendations. From what I’ve seen thus far, its worthwhile questioning the value of cholesterol medication in adults who aren’t at specific risk for cardiac events (there’s some debate as to whether cholesterol is the real marker).
To take data about 3 steps away from these kids and put them on medications with serious side effects seems insane at first glance– even if side effect ratios are low over time, the absolutely low number of heart attacks prevented minus the side effects caused discounted over time seems to make this equation very sketchy indeed. Whatever happened to first do no harm?