Scientist Suggests Super-Size Meals With a Side of Lipitor

Most fast food meals come with french fries and a large soda.  Some even offer a host of condiment options, from your standard ketchup and mustard to the more exotic sweet-and-sour dipping sauce. But if one scientist had his druthers, value meal combos would provide an additional side order — statins, a cholesterol-reducing, prescription drug.

I wish this were one of those funny, April Fools' Day-type posts, but unfortunately, I'm as serious as the heart attack statins work to prevent. Darrel Francis, a researcher at the Imperial College London, recently wrote an article in the American Journal of Cardiology that advocated for fast food restaurants offering cholesterol-reducing drugs with meals. According to a story in the Telegraph, Francis said that statins like Lipitor and Levacor reduce the risk of a heart attack by the same amount that a cheeseburger and milkshake increase it. In essence, pop a little pill with that value meal and voila, your health remains intact.

Francis even went so far as to say that fast food restaurants should offer these drugs the same way they provide packets of ketchup and mayonnaise. "It makes sense to make risk-reducing supplements available just as easily as the unhealthy condiments that are provided free of charge," Francis wrote. Francis then compared his public health suggestion to drivers wearing seatbelts or cigarettes with filters.

Hey Doc, I've got another super-secret, fast food tip that helps reduce the risk of heart attacks. I won't even make you read through a scientific journal to access this nugget of wisdom. Ready for it? Instead of fast food burgers and fries, try eating a diet high in fresh veggies and lean proteins.

Francis' suggestion is, well, kind of crackpot, and medical professionals back me up on this. Even if fast food restaurants did offer statins with meals, those pills would only combat high cholesterol, one of the many, many health problems eating fast food can cause. Fast food offerings like greasy burgers, french fries, milkshakes, and fried everything contain extremely high levels of salt, fat, calories, and sugar. In other words, folks who regularly consume vittles cooked by the Golden Arches or Burger King set themselves up for health problems like obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and stroke.

Providing statins at restaurants is like telling folks they've got a get-out-of-jail-free card for eating horrible food. It may be inconvenient, but maintaining a healthy lifestyle is much more complicated than just taking a pill. Peter Weisberg, Medical Director at the British Heart Foundation, put it best: "Statins are a vital medicine for people with — or at high risk of developing — heart disease," he told the Telegraph. "They are not a magic bullet."

Photo credit: ebruli via Flickr