Assuming that the "natural" (a question-begging term if ever there was
one) substance actually does the job.  There is no a priori reason to
assume that red rice/Mevacor will work for everyone.

 -- David Wright :: alphabeta at prodigy.net
    These are my opinions only, but they're almost always correct.
      "If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants
          were standing on my shoulders."  (Hal Abelson, MIT)

What makes you all think that the natural substance (mevastatin, which
is identical with the drug Mevacor) is without harmful effects?

Look, folks. Red rice yeast does not make mevastatin in order to lower
your cholesterol. It makes it as a natural antibiotic to poison other
yeasts. And possibly also larger animals that are trying to eat the
rice that the yeast wants.

Statins are cell-cycle disruptors. That's why they call them statins,
don't you know. To grow, cells need to make sterols and steroids, and
statins keep them from doing it. In that, they remind me of nothing so
much as small doses of chemotherapeutic agents. For example,
methotrexate. Methtrexate keeps cells from making DNA, but a small dose
of it has a somewhat similar effect on the immune system as statins do.
Fewer lymphocytes are made. Cellular immunity is disrupted. Autoimmune
diseases are modified. Voila. Including the autoimmune problems that
start with macrophage recruitment, then progress to foam cell
production, and on to atheroma.

SBH

sbharris atROMAN9.netcom.com