Drugs used to lower the levels of harmful 
If you suffer from asthma and are taking statin drugs to lower cholesterol you may find your symptoms increase.
A study of 40 asthma patients was carried out to look at the effect of statins on the respiratory condition.
Of the 40 patients, all treated in a Californian clinic for one year, half began to take statin medications at the start of the study. The other half was not taking the drug. All of those in the study were non smokers and all had been diagnosed with asthma at least five years previously.
Apart from asthma and high cholesterol, those included in the study were healthy and none had been in hospital or needed emergency treatment for their asthma in the eight months prior to the study.
Doctors checked their patients every three months, checking their symptoms, asked about their medication use and then tested their lung function.
After a year, the lung function of patients taking statins had decreased by 35 per cent, they reported that their asthma symptoms had got worse during the night and day and they had relied on their inhalers 72 percent more often than at the beginning of the study.
Those patients not taking statins also experienced a decline in their lung function, but only by 14 percent compared to the start of the study. They also used their inhalers more frequently, but only nine percent more than at the beginning.
The study was not able to prove that statins caused an increase in asthma symptoms, but instead showed that there was an association.
Researchers who ran the study say more work is needed to find the extent of the link between cholesterol-lowering drugs and asthma symptoms.