Statins are drugs that lower the level of cholesterol in the blood, and are now often given to people with high cholesterol levels, in order to reduce their risk of getting a heart attack.

In laboratory tests statins have been shown to stop the growth of cells from colorectal cancers, and this has led scientists to wonder whether the drug might actually prevent this type of cancer developing.

A recent study has looked at people who took statins for more than 5 years and found that they did seem to get far fewer large bowel cancers than other people.  Although this study is encouraging it is too soon to be sure that statins really do reduce the risk of getting bowel cancer, in fact some reports in the past have suggested it might actually increase the risk.  At least this study offers the reassurance that those other reports where probably wrong, but it would premature to suggest that people should be taking statins to help prevent bowel cancer.