Parkinson's and Statins
After some prodding, Perplexity AI admits that there is likely some connection between Parkinson's disease and statin use, at least in terms of the potentiality of progressing the disease along (making it worse). The supposed protective effects against cardiovascular disease were presented as the caveat against which the benefits of the cessation of statin use were weighed. Note that hydrophilic statins still reduce cholesterol by the same mechanism, inhibiting HMG-CoA, so though the argument presented is that they do not cross the blood-brain barrier as readily as lipophilic statins, they still reduce blood levels of cholesterol potentially involved in myelin regeneration, though most of that cholesterol is said to be produced by astrocytes. The basal ganglia degeneration characteristic of Parkinson's includes the degeneration of the myelin in that structure and older people have a more porous blood-brain barrier. I have provided the entire output below: Statin Use in Parkinso...