High Cholesterol in Middle Age Linked to Future Alzheimer's Risk

A new study that followed 9,844 members of the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Medical Group¹ for four decades has found that those who had total cholesterol greater than 250 when they were ages 40 to 45 were 57% more likely to develop Alzheimer's. Those whose total score was between 200 and 249 were 50% more likely to have developed dementia.

This study will invariably be used to promote the sale of statin drugs to lower cholesterol, although the study does not show (and no study ever will) that taking statins to lower cholesterol will reduce Alzheimer's in later life. That is because statin drugs actually destroy nerves and nerve transmission over time.

Also note, the cutoff for a problem is a total cholesterol of 200, not the dangerously low levels that are currently being promoted as “healthy.” I have long said total cholesterol should be between 160 to 200, not lower.
Furthermore, you want your cholesterol to be in this range because you are healthy, not because you drugged it there. There is a huge difference.