Aspirin can be a risk for healthy over-65s

TAKING aspirin every day may cause older people more harm the good, a major new study has concluded.

Research into nearly 20,000 over-65s found that those who were generally healthy derived no protective benefit from the blood-thinning pill – but it increased their risk of dangerous bleeds.

The study has been hailed by the medical community for its rigour.

In the UK, GPS generally do not advise aspirin for older people who have not previously suffered cardiovascular problems, such as a heart attack.

However, experts warned last night that tens of thousands of healthy people may be self-medicating with the overthe-counter drug on the basis of a flawed belief in its benefits.

For those who had previously survived a cardiovascular problem, regular aspirin was beneficial, the study found.

Scientists at Monash University in Australia enrolled 19,114 people aged 65 and older in Australia and the US, randomly giving them a daily low-dose aspirin or a placebo. They were then followed for an average of 4.7 years.

Among those randomly assigned to take aspirin, 90.3 per cent remained alive at the end of the treatment without a persistent physical disability or dementia, compared with 90.5 of those taking a placebo.

Meanwhile the aspirin group had a slightly increased risk of death overall

‘The small benefit on heart disease was outweighed by overall increases in other diseases’

compared with the placebo group – 5.9 per cent compared with 5.2 per cent.

However, significant bleeding, such as in the gastrointestinal tract and in the brain, occurred in 361 aspirin takers compared with 356 placebo takers.

Prof Stephen Evans, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said: “The small benefit on heart disease was outweighed by overall increases in other diseases and suggests that in healthy older people without heart disease there is no benefit to lowdose aspirin.”

The study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.