Warning labels urged for cholesterol drugs By Steve Sternberg, USA TODAY A rare but deadly side effect of the popular cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins has killed and injured more people than the government has acknowledged, the consumer watchdog group Public Citizen reported Monday. Thol levels and can reduce the number of deaths from heart disease and stroke by roughly 30%.

Instead, the watchdog grts that the totals are too high, he offered no specifics. The agency is considering revising warnings for the drugs.

Greg Reaves of Merck & Co., which markets simvastatin, or Zocor, and lovastatin, or Mevacor, says it would be far riskier for patients to stop taking statins without first talking to their doctors, because heart disease and stroke kill more than 1 million people every year. For every rhabdomyolysis death linked to simvastatin, Reaves says, the drug can be expected to save about 7,000 lives. Statins were prescribed almost 100 million times in the USA last year, reports IMS Health.