Just a little blurb I read in addition to your posting....
http://www.health.harvard.edu/fhg/fh.../Z1.shtml#stat
Statins Reduce C-reactive Protein
Half of all heart attack victims have normal cholesterol levels. Consequently, doctors are looking for new methods to improve heart disease prevention. One promising new approach involves testing for high levels of the inflammation marker C-reactive protein to identify people who might benefit from drug therapy.
C-reactive protein (CRP) is secreted from the liver in response to inflammation in the body. Because atherosclerosis is partly an inflammatory process, high levels of CRP have been shown to predict the risk of heart disease. A new study has found that statins can reduce the risk of coronary events in people who have high levels CRP. These drugs are already used to lower LDL cholesterol, but the researchers found its anti-inflammatory effect was independent of its cholesterol-lowering abilities.
The five-year randomized trial done at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School involved 5,742 participants. The researchers found that Lovastatin decreased both CRP levels by an average of 14.8% and the rates of coronary events. Other statins has also previously been shown to reduce CRP levels.
This study suggests statins may be an effective preventive therapy for people with high CRP levels — even if they have low or normal LDL cholesterol. Though everyone is encouraged to make healthy lifestyle changes to reduce their heart disease risk, only those at high-risk are candidates for these costly drugs. And measuring CRP levels in conjunction with cholesterol testing should better identify these high-risk individuals.
July 2001 Update
Article: Benefit From Statins 10 Years After Taking Them 
