there is at best a weak correlation of high cholesterol and CHD. This correlation does not appear in women, nor in men over the age of 50 (in that group the correlation is negative - higher cholesterol=lower CHD incidence). A correlation does not imply causality, both phenomena could be caused by something else. There are numerous studies attempting to correlate high cholesterol with sclerosis of the arteries of randomly selected subjects. They have all found no correlation at all. Some of the most convincing of these are ones where sudden death patients (accident, murder victims, etc.) were autopsied and the level of actual observed sclerosis compared to cholesterol levels. There have been a few of these. No correlation has been found to exist, i.e., random.

Studies like these are not widely published, no salesperson will call on the doctor and explain it to them. There is no $20B budget to do it.

Illustrative of the behavior of drug companies is the recent history of Vytorin (this is a combination of statin and ezetemibe). This was being widely prescribed and was a several billion dollar business for Merck. When their own large scale study showed no benefit, they delayed publishing it until forced to by the FDA. Just business.

If you feel you must lower your cholesterol, you can do so by taking niacin which is far safer than statin as drugs go. Drug companies do not like niacin and they do not study it (no money to be made). However, the belief that lowering moderately high cholesterol by whatever means will markedly change your likelihood of a heart attack, except for some very small and specific subgroups, is a fantasy, unsupported by science.

Statin, in particular, ought to be approached with considerable caution. Some of the largest trials showed a vanishingly small benefit accompanied by an equal increase in morbidity due to cancer (which the authors dismissed as an "anomaly", even though of about the same magnitude as the claimed benefit). In other words, you don't decrease your risk of dying, but merely exchange the possibility of a heart attack for cancer - not a tradeoff that most people would choose.