IN what scientists are calling a "cholesterol paradox," new research is linking low cholesterol with a higher death rate in people with heart failure -- the opposite of what researchers expected.

"The low cholesterol levels were a predictor of higher mortality, which is contrary to what one would expect in patients with heart failure," he said. "You would expect the low cholesterol would be better. That was surprising."

"We now have six very large trials of statin use (cholesterol-lowering drugs) in patients with heart disease, and these studies have more than 100,000 people in them, and in none of these studies where the cholesterol was lowered tremendously is there an increase in heart failure," said Dr. Jacques Genest, head of cardiology at Montreal's McGill University and a spokesman for the Heart and Stroke Foundation.