Cholesterol and Blood Pressure as Neglected Dietary Interventions?

Summary notes from a surprising conversation with Brian Toomey who has done some investigation on these topics for his own and friends' health.

• LDL and blood pressure are both independent risk factors for CVD and mortality
• High readings of one or both are incredibly common (~25% of adults for LDL, ~40% of adults for BP in the United States)
• Standard treatment for these involve statins and ace inhibitors respectively, which have serious side effects associated with them including problems when people's adherence to them is inconsistent
• Some forms of these medicines were derived from natural sources, and ingestion of said natural sources does not seem to include the side effects from their synthesized forms. Here several mushroom species contain high levels of lovastatin and several fruits and seeds contain natural ace inhibitors
• The expectation is that the synthesized versions have larger effect size, but the opposite appears to be true when dosing correctly
• This knowledge is not widespread and deserves further evaluation of potential QALY's on the line