Red Yeast has not been banned, you just can't sell it as a treatment for high cholesterol. Why? It hasn't gone through clinical trials.
You might argue what's the difference between a tablet of lovastatin and Red Yeast? Well, I don't know and the FDA doesn't either that's why you can't make medical claims about it.
I'm glad it worked for you! Also, lovastatin went generic a long time ago and it now costs a few hundred dollars (if that) a year to treat a patient.
"Red Yeast has not been banned, you just can't sell it as a treatment for high cholesterol."
Wikipedia disagrees with you. It says, if a product has a measurable amount of monacolin K, i.e., lovastatin in it the FDA will stop it's sale even if there aren't any claims of cholesterol reduction.
> You might argue what's the difference between a tablet of lovastatin and Red Yeast?
The tablet of lovastatin has a precise amount of active ingredient. Red yeast rice has some random amount that may or may not be clinically significant.
Along those same lines, if you fill your prescriptions at WalMart, then for $40 per year you can take atorvastatin 80mg (Lipitor; one of the best studied high potency statins) every day.
This is about $10 per year (~3 cents per day) more expensive than cheap red yeast rice.
You might argue what's the difference between a tablet of lovastatin and Red Yeast? Well, I don't know and the FDA doesn't either that's why you can't make medical claims about it.
I'm glad it worked for you! Also, lovastatin went generic a long time ago and it now costs a few hundred dollars (if that) a year to treat a patient.