it is worrying to think about how subtle changes in senior politicians behaviours may be caused by their medications.

The neurological effects of cholesterol depletion can produce a wide range of mental conditions reported to be associated with serum cholesterol depletion. Depression, violent behaviour, homicidal
behaviour and suicide are all known associates of cholesterol depletion [58, 59]. In a recent study, cholesterol content was measured in cortical and subcortical tissue of brains from 41 male suicide completers and 21 male controls. Violent suicides were found to have lower gray matter cholesterol content overall compared with nonviolent suicides and controls [60]. Randomised trials with statins have not shown a definite association between cholesterol-lowering
treatment and non-illness mortality from suicides, accidents, and violence [61, 62]. However, statin trials are specifically designed to test drug efficacy, often with run-in phases, and investigators usually
conduct the studies in groups of patients who have few comorbidities and are not using many concomitant medications, and when side effects are measured, their seriousness and severity are not graded. Indeed, in clinical practice it has been suggested that severe anger and irritability may occour in some statin users [63].
Neural systems have significant vulnerability to cholesterol depletion. First is the reduction in the synaptic exocytosis and endocytosis of essential signalling lipoproteins; then comes the vulnerability due to the high dependency of myelination on denovo cholesterol biosynthesis.

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SH. Cholesterol reduction and non-illness mortality: metaanalysis
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