If you remember from science class, mitochondria are the little battery packs in your cells. They’re what give you energy, and there’s a new study out showing how statin drugs are destroying your mitochondria!
The purpose of statin drugs is to lower your cholesterol, but this study shows how the cell wall is being damaged and your production of CoQ10 is being diminished.
Join Dr. Martin in today’s episode as he discusses mitochondrial health and why it’s so important!
TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE
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Dr. Martin: Well, good morning everyone. Once again, welcome to another Live this morning. Hope you're having a great start to your day. Welcome back. Okay. After a little holiday break here, study came out in the last week. Okay. Just before Christmas, a study came out on statin drugs. You know what statin drugs are? Statin drugs are cholesterol lowering drugs. In Canada, we don't see these commercials, but now of course, TV is all over the place and whatever. If you ever seen a commercial for a statin drug, people are giving each other high fives, because they've lowered their cholesterol.
Whoopi doopy, "I have heart disease and I lowered my cholesterol," but this study is showing, and I want to explain it, unpack it to you, this study is showing again, having low cholesterol. What does that do for you other than early mortality? You want to see your name in the obituaries early? Well, then have low cholesterol. That is a fact. Okay.
But this study talked about the side effects. One of the major side effects of statin drugs. The side effects of statin drugs are legion, meaning there are many. Now, let me just give you one of them, before I get into this study. Ladies, this is meant for you. Do you know that 50% of women that take a statin drug, 50%, half, get diabetes? They develop Type 2 diabetes. What? "Yeah, but I have low cholesterol." You might have low cholesterol, but you're going to become a diabetic. I'm telling you, it's craziness.
Now, let me unpack this study. Here's the headline, "Statin, drugs destroy your mitochondria," okay, "Statin, drugs, destroy your mitochondria." Now, what's that mean? What's that mean? Now, you guys know I flunked art, okay. When I draw you a little picture this morning, don't get too uptight about how bad it looks. Okay? Just try and get the big picture. Okay.
Here is my great grandchildren could draw better than I can. Okay. My grandpa, that's the way it was. Okay? The teachers would give the class extra recess, when I was in grade school, one, if they could read my writing and two, if I could draw a circle. I was no good at either one of them. It's amazing I got through school. Now, here is a cell. Here is cell. Now, you've got trillions of cells. You've got heart cells, you've got muscle cells, you've got bone cells, mass cells, you've got brain cells, you got cells right throughout your body. The basic unit of life.
When you take a statin drug, what they're showing is it destroys two things in your cells. See the cell wall? You know what that cell wall is made up of? Cholesterol. Cholesterol. Why would you want to lower your cholesterol? You want to increase your cholesterol, not lower. Okay? That's one thing.
Number two, see these little wee, not circular, the circle here is your nucleus. You learn that in high school. Right? Or grade school and your RNA and your DNA is in there and your cells are different than anybody else's cells. There's more information in that little cell. 500 books of a thousand pages each are programmed inside your DNA. You think you're not fearfully and wonderfully made? You are. You are unique, by the way. There's nobody that has your DNA, nobody. You have an identical twin? They don't even have your DNA. Okay? That's one thing. Now, these are your little mitochondria. What are mitochondria? They are battery packs. Your little cells have batteries, the EverReady bunny.
Well, that's what they're supposed to do. They produce energy. You eat, your food gets micro sized. It gets into the cell. It's transported to the cell by your blood. Your blood is a river that brings you nutrition. Insulin is one of the things that opens up the cell wall. It says, "Hey, here's some fuel." The mitochondria take that fuel, okay, from your food. Take food and they produce energy in these little battery packs. We call that ATP. That's your fuel that it produces.
Now what they're showing, and this is very serious guys, that statin drug, the number one selling drug of all time, Lipitor and people might be on Crestor or Zocor. The number one selling drug of all time, sells more than aspirin, is statin drugs. What they're showing in this study is that it destroys your mitochondria. Okay? Those little battery packs not good.
Here's the point I want to make. When you look for love in all the wrong places, you're going to get a wrong conclusion. Now, remember I've taught you this over and over and over again, for the last 50 years or more the pharmaceutical industry and the food industry are in cahoots. Now, I'm not saying there's not good people. I'm not saying there's not good scientists. I'm not saying any of that, but they've combined in a unholy network to make cholesterol the boogeyman. Boy have they succeeded.
Even today, 99.9% of every physician that comes out of medical school is taught cholesterol bad. Cholesterol, because you see, they see heart disease, okay, they see heart disease as a plumbing problem. You got problem with your plumbing. What do they mean by that? Well, your blood vessels are going to get all clogged up because you're eating cholesterol. We got to lower that and I'd been screaming from the rooftops to anyone that would listen, that that is patent nonsense. It's not true. It's not true.
Here we have another study. I mean, there's been a lot of studies on the side effects of statin drugs, but another one out that says it aims directly at your mitochondria and it destroys them. It destroys the battery packs. "Yeah, but doc, my cholesterol went down. I know, I got no energy, but my cholesterol went down." That's not a good thing. It's not a good thing. You don't want your cholesterol to go down and you certainly don't want your energy to go down. Okay? Really, really important.
This is why, by the way, just a little proof of the pudding, again, commercials on TV, they'll often talk about CoQ10. Right? "Oh, get this CoQ10. It's the best CoQ10 you can take. It's called ubiquinol. Okay. You'll see different companies advertising for that. Okay. Ubiquinol CoQ10. Why do they even talk about that? Well, CoQ10, I can tell you something. Okay, like I said, I've been around a long time, 50 years.
That's old, 50 years. You want to talk about supplements? Okay, let's talk about supplements for a minute. I'm going to tell you something. In the 1970s, I know what CoQ10 is. I studied CoQ10. Let me tell you something, your body makes CoQ10. It makes it. What? Yeah. Well, CoQ10 comes out of your mitochondria. Your body makes CoQ10 and CoQ10, it's part of your energy.
When your mitochondria work properly, when a statin drug destroys your mitochondria and destroys your CoQ10, you know what? Even a cardiologist would agree with this. If a cardiologist does any reading, even in some medical journals, because this study came out of a medical journal. If a cardiologist studies CoQ10, they'll realize doesn't take long.
The last thing on earth you want to do is destroy your CoQ10 and you'll see advertising on TV that says, "If you're taking a statin drug, you need to take CoQ10." Okay? CoQ10. But remember your body actually makes it. You see, you don't hear me talking too much about CoQ10 in terms of a supplement. Now, I have a CoQ10 in one of my products, but there's a reason I have that. But let me tell you, first of all, that CoQ10, the best source of it, the way your body makes it. Okay?
Let me unpack this a little bit, so that you understand what I'm saying. Your body makes CoQ10 from the food you eat. Okay? Your body makes CoQ10 from the food you eat. Guess what foods? I'm waiting. Guess how you make CoQ10? What? Yeah. Animal kingdom. You get CoQ10 from the animal kingdom. Eggs, CoQ10. Meat, steak, vitamin S, CoQ10, and cheese, CoQ10. Do you know that you do not make CoQ10 when you have salad, ladies. You don't. Now, I'm not saying don't eat salad. You know how I love to tease you, but I'm telling you, you do not make CoQ10, when you are a vegetarian or a vegan.
Well, vegetarians would eat a little bit of eggs. Wouldn't they? Vegans don't. Guys, that's how you make CoQ10. Do you think CoQ10's important? It's very important, but those little battery packs. This is your cell and a battery pack is more like this. Your little battery packs are really important, because at the end of the day, they produce CoQ10, ATP. ATP is fuel.
You know me, I'm big on changing fuel, changing fuel. Most people in North America, their problem isn't cholesterol. Their problem is eating crappy food. They are carb-aholics. They live on bread, pasta, rice, cereal, sugar, sweets, pastries, store bought milk, juice. Those are carbohydrates. They eat fast foods, crappy carbs, plus cooked in the wrong oil, vegetable oils, the middle little oils of your grocery store from cookies to ketchup, crappy oils, full of sugar, added sugars.
You eat that fuel and right down to the cellular level, right down to your little mitochondria inside your cells, they're only going to produce ATP that you eat. You want a bad fuel, this is why I'm saying, okay. Let me give you another little example. Let's give you an example of this. I love illustrations. Okay?
Yesterday I was in a plane. I was in an airplane yesterday. That's why I was awake. Listen to what I'm going to say. When they fueled up their airplane yesterday, the plane I was getting in, a fuel truck didn't come on the local gas station. Okay? I'm just telling you, I know that for a fact. They didn't say, "Well, you know what? We're trying to cut back and save some money." What is it in Canada per liter? $1.50 on average, a liter. In the United States, about $3.20 or whatever it is a gallon. They didn't get the 87, 88 or even 91 octane. That truck didn't come from the local gas station. You know what? They have their own fuel. It's called jet fuel.
When you put a jet fuel in jets, I remember, this is a little side, but let me just, have you ever heard of chem trails? There's been stuff written about it. You see in the planes their exhaust. Right? The debris, because it's burning fuel. You'll always have some debris. They said, "Oh doc, what do you think of chem trails?" You see if you are burning good fuel, like high octane, 99% octane fuel, like a jet... The exhaust coming out of their, I mean, there's some debris, but it's not bad. It like a car even, but a car is better than it used to be. That's one of the things they're talking about in the environment. Carbon. Right?
You go to China. I've been to China and there's a smog, not a fog, a smog. It's all of the manufacturing plants and the debris. Okay. I like clean air like you do. By the way, that's why the Chinese wore masks, not for viruses. It was for pollution. Anyway, all I'm saying, guys, the fuel that goes in, is really important at the cellular level, because of two reasons. One, is the amount of ATP, pure octane that you'll get from food. Two, the CoQ10 you'll get, that you'll produce.
Now, your body will make CoQ10, but not much of it, if you're eating from the animal kingdom. That's how you make CoQ10. Think about this for a minute. If statin drugs, meant to lower cholesterol, destroy the mitochondria in your cells, especially muscle cells. Muscle cells. It destroys the CoQ10 in the mitochondria of muscle cells. Guys, I get a splitting headache when I think about this, I get a migraine. Isn't your heart a muscle? Isn't it? It's a pump.
You want to have good fuel going to that pump. Your little cells, your muscle cells in your heart, so that they will release the best ATP fuel, so your heart, a hundred thousand times a day. Boom, it's pushing the blood through your body. A pump. Why would you want to lower that? You want that pump. You don't even think about it, do you? Unless you have something like AFib. Question, why do millions of people today suffer from atrial fibrillation? Why? I'm a why guy. Why do people suffer like that? I'm telling you why, they eat the wrong fuel. Mm-hmm (affirmative). They don't get enough CoQ10, you need CoQ10 for your heart's grid.
You've got an electrical grid up here. Neurons, nerves, neurotransmitters, and your heart has an electrical grid and muscle. It needs CoQ10 to work properly. That's why vitamin S is the best thing. Vitamin steak is the best food for your heart. Not what they tell you. "Oh, red meat don't eat any red meat. It's going to clog." You see? Because they're thinking plumbing. They're thinking plumbing. "Oh, that's, that's how you clog up your arteries." You don't clog up your arteries with cholesterol. Blaming cholesterol for heart disease is like blaming the police. They're at the crime scene, or the firefighters. Of course they're going to be at fires, but they're not the bad guy.
Cholesterol needs to be circulating. Are your blood vessels? Why? Because they're the FedEx trucks. They're the Canada Post, the US Post Service. What are they doing? They're hitching their wagon to what? Bad fats. Not only are they transporting your hormones, ladies, cholesterol transports your hormones. Cholesterol hitches their wagons to the dangerous fats in your blood vessels, called triglycerides.
Statin drugs don't fix triglycerides. They destroy the very thing that goes after triglycerides. Cholesterol. This is why when you send me blood work, I don't want to know what your cholesterol is. I'm sorry. I want to know what your triglycerides are versus is your HDL. Only that. Not LDL. HDL. The wagons, the trucks on the highways that hitch their wagon to bad fats. Triglycerides, three fat balls. How do you make three fat balls? Sugar.
Now, look, I never tell a person, I don't, not to take medication. I don't do that. I'm not your doctor. Okay? But I'm an educator. I want you to understand how your body operates. I want you... Did you get our email this morning? Okay, we put out an email this morning. In there, we said, "We want you to be the most educated in terms of how your body works."
You don't need to be a rocket scientist. You don't. I remember when I started practice in the mid '70s. Doctor was everything. You could hardly ask a question. "Me doctor, don't ask me any questions. I know what's best for you." Wasn't there a show when I was a little kid, Doctor Knows Best? It's not that they don't know, but it's a good thing to question. Right? I try and get people ask questions, ask questions. I remember saying this 40 years ago, "Take a note pad to your doctor's office. Ask them questions. Why doc?" Sometimes they don't like that, but I think you have every right. It's your body. If you're going to take something, ask the questions, "Why?"
Okay. Your mitochondria health is very important. You want to produce the best ATP you can. 99% rocket fuel. You want to operate at the highest level from your brain to your toes. You want your body to produce energy and this is why, for example, in chronic fatigue syndrome, I wrote about this guys 35 years ago. My very first book was on chronic fatigue and I talked about the mitochondrial health. I was talking about people that had no ATP. They were producing a fuel just enough for a mouse, just enough for them to operate, but hardly get out of bed. The number one reason, the number one reason, even today, that people go see their doctors is low energy.
Now, that can be a lot of things. If you have fatigue, I mean, of course doctors, their flags go off and at least they should and they order blood work. They want to know, because fatigue is a general symptom and it's a clue. I don't blame. They're ordering blood work. I was explaining to someone the other day, the problem with blood work, a couple of things. One, they often are looking for love in the wrong places.
If you're doing testing, I'll give you an example. The TSH. TSH is thyroid stimulating hormone. Okay? It was developed in the 1970s, when I was in school. I remember it well. "Oh, we can do a new test. It's called TSH." Yeah, but its range is from here to eternity and what's normal on a thyroid blood test? This is why I always trained my staff. I always trained my patients to understand that symptoms, for example, ladies coming into the office, thinning hair, thinning eyebrows, weight gain, brittle nails, you name it. I used to say, because my dad taught me this, if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it's a duck.
If you got those symptoms, well, your thyroid's not working properly. Let's... "Oh yeah. But doc, my TSH is normal." You know how many thousands of times I heard that? I don't care what your blood work, I'm going to do more specific tests. I'm going to look at your hormones in conjunction, because there was different thyroid tests that you could do.
Not only that, I took those symptoms very seriously. I said, "Well obviously you have a thyroid problem, but let's find out why, because your thyroid's like a puppet. It's got many strings attached to it. Let's find out why." But one of the things that I used to look at was the mitochondria. How much ATP you were producing. A lot of people were surviving on fumes, not fuel, fumes. What's the first thing that we did? We changed their diet. You have to start with that. You have to start with getting your ATP up, not down, getting your CoQ10 up, not down, getting your cholesterol up, not down.
Okay. Hey, I miss this. I miss ranting. My poor wife. She has to listen to my rants. Before you guys get it, I tell my wife the new study or I tell my kids or my grandchildren. "Grandpa, you're a one trick pony." You remember that expression? Okay. Okay. Guys, thanks for listening. Okay? We appreciate it.
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Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!