Dr. Aseem Malhotra

So if you've had a heart attack already, let's say the high-risk group, you have to treat 83 people over five years for one to have their life saved or life prolonged, right?

Okay, and for preventing a further heart attack, one in 39.

Now, most people around the world, Mark, who are prescribed statins are not in that group.

They are in the either low risk.

75%, right?

Yeah, exactly.

Low risk or what we call high risk primary prevention.

Now, the benefits of a statin over a five-year period in that group, at best, is 1% in preventing a non-fatal heart attack, a non-disabling stroke, okay, but without prolonging a life by one day.

So this again comes back to, now, this is just my opinion.

It's like, oh, is the CMH just cherry picking statistics here?

2009, Gerd Gigerenze, the director of the Max Planck Institute for health literacy in Berlin.

This is the same institution that Einstein taught and trained in.

Brilliant guy.

He wrote in a WHO bulletin in 2009, it is an ethical imperative for every doctor to understand the difference between absolute risk reduction, numbers need to be treated, and relative risk reduction.

And he said, to protect patients from unnecessary anxiety and manipulation.

So in other words, I paraphrase this, if you have that information, and again, most doctors are not trained this way, Mark, this is a problem, you should use it and tell patients this is what I do.

And a patient comes in, it's like, should I take a statin or not?

I say, well, let me empower you with the information, tell me what you think.

Most patients with the 1% thing think, hold on a minute.

I don't think that's that great, doc.