I haven’t taken a poll of my friends to find out how many are taking statins, but quite a few are over age 45 — those most likely to be on these drugs. If they are taking a cholesterol lowering drug, I hope their doctors have warned them of the myriad of health risks associated with taking them. But honestly, I doubt they have.
I’m well aware of the dangerous side effects of these drugs as my mother has taken Lipitor (Atorvastatin) for as long as I can remember.
After the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved statins in 1987, they were so effective at shrinking cholesterol levels that some doctors (jokingly?) said they should be added to the water supply. Others advocated making them an over-the-counter drug available to everyone.
Statins became the most-prescribed prescription drugs ever developed and generated blockbuster profits for the drug companies.
However, by 2012, accounts of serious side effects had piled up to an extent that the FDA slapped new warning labels on statins: Liver damage. Type 2 diabetes. Muscle weakness. Memory loss and confusion.
But as dire as they were, the warnings weren’t enough to keep doctors from singing statins’ praises and suggesting prescribing them to an even-larger group of people with cholesterol numbers below the current criteria. This would essentially add millions more people to the list of statin users.
Unfortunately, the FDA omitted one very important warning on their new labels. They didn’t warn patients that statins not only lower your cholesterol — but they deplete your body of Coenzyme Q10, better known as CoQ10.
And that explains a lot about my Mom’s debilitating fatigue, joint and hip pain and brain fog.

Why do statins deplete CoQ10?

Statins lower cholesterol by blocking the enzyme HMG-CoA, which is necessary for cholesterol synthesis. The problem? The HMG-CoA enzyme is also required for CoQ10 synthesis, which all cells need for their energy metabolism.
In other words, by preventing the formation of cholesterol by the liver, statins also inhibit the body’s CoQ10 production.
CoQ10 has been compared to a spark plug that jump-starts the body’s “engine” by igniting energy production within your cells. That cellular energy is essential to fuel healthy biological functions in every part of your body. When you lose CoQ10, your cells lose the ability to make energy.

What’s so important about CoQ10?

When your cells can’t make enough energy, you not only lose muscle strength and stamina — you can develop lots of debilitating problems: soreness… hypertension… fatigue… premature aging… even stroke and heart failure.
That’s why it’s so important for people taking a statin to replace lost CoQ10 with a supplement.
It’s ironic that people are put on statins to decrease their risk of cardiovascular disease and heart attacks — but by reducing CoQ10, statins have been shown to increase that risk.
Research shows CoQ10 not only keeps your cholesterol and blood pressure at healthy levels, but it’s also important to many other aspects of heart health. CoQ10 has been found to:

• Help support a healthy cardiovascular system and reduce inflammation
• Reduce the risk of a major heart event by 50 percent
• Promote healthy systolic blood pressure without significant side effects
• Spark energy production and scavenge free radicals that cause damage

When I talked Mom into regularly taking the daily recommended 100mg of a CoQ10, she soon regained the spring in her step and many of her annoying problems started clearing.
But it’s difficult to find a CoQ10 supplement that can be fully absorbed by your body. And supplementing with the right CoQ10 is very important.
So how do you find the most absorbable CoQ10 supplement on the market? Well, it all has to do with the way it’s made.
Many CoQ10 products consist of capsules filed with the raw CoQ10 material — dry powder crystals the body can’t absorb. Some manufacturers use a process to break the crystals into separate, absorbable molecules. But it’s difficult to get the CoQ10 molecules into capsules without recrystallizing due to temperature fluctuations during production, which again makes the CoQ10 very hard to absorb.
Due to a unique manufacturing process, in just one soft-gel of Peak CoQSol10 CF^™ you’ll get 100 mg of 100 percent crystal-free CoQ10 in the form of Ubiquinol. In comparison to conventional CoQ10, that gives you superior absorption, higher CoQ10 blood levels and the heart protection you need — especially for those taking cholesterol lowering drugs, like my Mom.

Sources:
Axe, J. All About CoQ10: Benefits, Foods, Supplements & More. Dr.Axe, Food Is Medicine. https://draxe.comall-about-coq10/
Coenzyme Q10 and Statins. Pharma Nord. pharmanord.com/news/coenzyme-q10-and-statins. Nov. 30, 2016.
Mercola, J. Statin Drugs Create Over 60,000 New Diabetics Each Year. Mercola.com. articles. mercola.com/sites/articles/arcchives/2012/o5/06/fda-warning-on-statins.aspx. May 6, 2012.
Richard. Crystal-free Coenzyme Q10 supplements. Q10 Facts. q10facts.com/crystal-free-coenzyme-q10-supplements/. Aug. 7, 2016.