The authors carried out a coronary heart disease risk factor screening on 1240 people of two villages of Békés county, Hungary. The prevalence of coronary heart disease among the 969 people 35-70 years old was 12.0%, in the different age groups varied between 0.8 and 20.9%. This high prevalence could be explained by the high occurence of the different risk factors. The results of cholesterol levels were analysed according to that of Scandinavian Simvastatin Survival Study. From 35-70 years old screened people with coronary heart disease 77 had a cholesterol level between 5.5 and 8.0 mmol/l. In these patients with 20-40 mg daily dose of simvastatin during 5.4 years long treatment from 7 predicted coronary death 3, from 17 expected non fatal myocardial infarction 5, from 13 anticipated revascularisation procedures 5 would be preventable. The 5.4 years long treatment with 20 mg simvastatin calculated with the prices of July 1996 in Hungary would cost 292831 forints, from which 87847 has to be paid by the patient. If the decrease of hospitalization costs of the coronary heart disease patients treated with simvastatin is also taken into account, the drug treatment costs, according to the literature, could be reduced with additional 88%.