On Tuesday, after voting on the issue, the US Food and Drug Administration panel supported the wider use of Crestor, a cholesterol lowering drug from the house of AstraZeneca PLC.

Made up of outside medical experts, the panel voted 12-4 for the motion, with 1 member abstaining on a question that queried that whether or not the benefit of the medicine offset the risks faced by patients who have no heart problems as of now, or are presently considered at a lower risk of developing the disease.

The panel vote now amounts to the support of the recommendation that Crestor can also be used as a preventive treatment for cardiovascular diseases. Although the FDA is now bound to follow what the panel says, it usually does.

To gain approval for wider use of the drug, AstraZeneca funded an extensive 18,000 patients study christened "Jupiter", and analyzed those "whose cholesterol levels were normal or slightly elevated but had an elevated C-reactive protein level". These patients were then either placed on Crestor, or a placebo, and analysis of follow-up data collected led the pharma company to believe that the drug actually did manage to reduce the risks associated with heart diseases.

With the new ruling, AstraZeneca will now be able to market the drug to over 65 million new patients.