Evolutionary medicine: hypercholesterolaemia

Dr Malik says:

My summary of this interesting article: as humans evolved in a cycle of mainly food shortage, and occasional feast, and did not live into a ripe old age, the authors argue that having more lipids in the blood leads to a reproductive survival advantage. Perhaps you survived starvation better, perhaps you could run from a sabre tooth tiger faster.
Who knows – but to cope with 21st century risks, the reproduction is perhaps not the issue: living well and living longer is; thus the focus on diet, exercise, control of risk factors especially smoking, blood pressure and diabetes.
For the Medics, it explains lipid metabolism. For the non-medics, biologically plausible mechanisms to explain why we are built as we are… BUT it does not mean that is the truth.
Posted on 05 September 2019
Author: Dr Iqbal Malik
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