"According to cardiologist David Becker, a study published in the journal 'Mayo Clinic Proceeding', red yeast rice can help reduce bad chloesterol as effictively as the statin drug Zocor.  "This might be an alternative for some people," says cardiologist David Becker.  Becker says he'd been hearing anecdotes for years that red yeast rice was effective in lowering cholesterol - in fact, the original statin drugs were derived from a similar yeast.  To test this, he put about 35 patients on Zocor (simvastatin).  They took 40 milligrams per day.  The other volunteers in the study took red yeast rice supplements.

"After 12 weeks the results were virtually indistinguishable," Becker said.  Patients in both groups significantly reduced their cholesterol levels - especially the bad cholesterol, called low-density liproproteins.  Becker says the LDL levels for both groups fell by about 40 percent.

                                                                                        Natural Healing Foods by Pamela Young