Drinking coffee extends your life
Good news for the coffee lovers among us. If you drink more than five cups of coffee a day, you will live longer. This is shown by an epidemiological study. According to that study, a daily high coffee intake reduces your risk of mortality by several tens of percent.
The researchers, who are affiliated with Harvard University, analyzed the data of forty thousand men and ninety thousand women, whom they followed for 18 and 24 years respectively. If the men drank 6 or more cups of coffee a day, their mortality risk was 20 percent lower than that of non-coffee drinkers. In women, this intake reduced the risk of death by 17 percent. The more coffee the men and women drank, the more their risk or mortality decreased.
The positive effect of coffee only came to light when the researchers took into account that the elderly and smokers drink more coffee. Because the elderly and smokers simply have a higher risk of dying, coffee was only found to extend life expectancy after the researchers had brushed aside those factors.
The heavy coffee drinkers received almost nine hundred milligrams of caffeine per day. That had no positive or negative health effects, the researchers discovered. When they dug into their data, they found that coffee consumption reduced the risk of fatal cardiovascular disease in the first place. In addition, coffee also protected against type-2 diabetes and liver cirrhosis and cancer.
Drinking 6 or more cups of coffee a day reduced the risk of dying from type 2 diabetes or liver disease by 43 and 65 percent, respectively. However, because these causes of death are not as important as death from cardiovascular disease, they do not make such a huge difference.
As for diabetes, the protective substances in coffee are magnesium, cholorogenic acid, trigonelline and quinides, the Harvardians suspect. These components increase the sensitivity to insulin in the cells. Phenols in coffee, such as again cholorogenic acid, ferulic acid and p-coumaric acid, probably protect the heart and blood vessels. They inhibit the formation of blood clots and prevent the 'bad cholesterol' LDL from rusting and damaging blood vessels.
More and more epidemiological studies show coffee positively. According to those researchers, coffee consumption not only extends life, but also slows down the rate of mental aging and reduces the risk of Parkinson's disease.
Source: Ergogenics – http://goo.gl/HDxECN
If drinking a lot of coffee extends your life, I will live to be 120 years old.
I was a driver for 40 years and drank a lot of coffee and on a trip to Italy or Norway, 20 cups of coffee were quite normal, she could make it in the truck, so no problem.
And now here in Thailand I also drink 6 to 8 a day.
I don't drink alcohol so coffee is a good alternative.
Well if your heart is ok, my cardiologist tells me a whole different story.
A few years ago, coffee was crushed. It would be particularly bad for your heart. Now a completely opposite opinion. Then the question arises, who paid for this research?
I myself used to be a strong coffee drinker, but at some point I started to cut down. This because it made my hands shake.
I haven't believed in this kind of research for a long time. A former acquaintance, who works at TNO, always said: “we investigate everything as long as there is only one customer who pays.”
Kidney stones can be crushed, coffee is ground.
Yes, Frans, sharp and a funny comment. In today's first article, the statement of the week is that it is normal that you have to pay if you keep a table occupied. Bon Café in Bangkok should translate the results of this research into Thai and hang it up in the café. Good for his turnover if those who occupy his tables drink more coffee. I personally stick to Tino Kruis's advice, just drink a normal amount of coffee because I like it. And when it comes to Irish coffee, I definitely have to keep it in check!
I am a heavy coffee drinker myself. Nice to hear something positive about the coffee addiction 🙂
Coffee certainly has an influence on a longer life, but it depends on more things.
For example, someone who does not exercise much and is therefore overweight, or someone who consumes excessive alcohol and also smokes like a locomotive, can prolong his life slightly with coffee, but the chance that he will die young remains very high. Now many smokers and drinkers will come up with the story of their 90-year-old grandfather, who despite everything has lived to be so old, and like to ignore the fact that grandfather might have lived to be 100 years old, with a healthier way of life.
Here we go again. I looked through the link below where that story originally came from and that is an investigation published here:
Ann Intern Med. 2008 Jun 17;148(12):904-14.)
The conclusion of the study was:
Regular coffee consumption was not associated with an increased mortality rate in either men or women. The possibility of a modest benefit of coffee consumption on all-cause and CVD mortality needs to be further investigated.
Regular consumption of coffee is not associated with an increased risk of mortality, neither in men nor in women. The possibility of a small benefit of coffee consumption on all-cause mortality needs further investigation.
Then I looked at the graphs and you see that mortality increases by 10 percent with one cup of coffee and gradually decreases to 10 percent less mortality with 6 cups of coffee. This falls within the scope of chance in such a study and is therefore not significant.
Then I quickly looked for more articles about the effect of coffee consumption on mortality. That fans out in all directions: no effect, positive effect, negative effect. That is to be expected because what is a cup of coffee (survey participants only said how many cups they used): large or small? How was the coffee made, boiling or filtering? There can therefore be a big difference in the type and content of chemicals between two 'cups of coffee'
Another publication: an analysis and summary of 23 other studies:
Nutr Metab Cardiovasc Dis. 2007 Mar;17(3):209-23. Epub 2006 Dec 5.
CONCLUSIONS:
Despite a significant association between high consumption of coffee and CHD (coronary heart disease) reported among case-control studies, no significant association between daily coffee consumption and CHD emerged from long-term follow-up prospective cohort studies.
Summary conclusion: in some studies there is a link between coffee consumption and heart disease, but if you add up and summarize 23 studies there is no difference.
Just drink coffee because you like it. It does nothing for your health.
Mr. Tina Cross,
I also read that article in the 'Annals of Internal Medicines' of June 17, 2008 compiled by 5 scientists. It is therefore not at all the case that drinking a lot of coffee benefits health. And that is not suggested at all in this article. Several more recent articles point to the negative influences of excessive caffeine use on health. It is therefore wise not to take 'drinking a lot of coffee prolongs your life' too literally, and also to bear in mind when consuming coffee that 'too much is harmful'.
And a nice cup of iced coffee Oh Liang, a good alternative to a bottle of M150 or a pill yaa baa
Interesting to read that your chance of dying can be reduced by 20% by drinking coffee. I always thought my chance of dying was 100%, but apparently something can be done about that. Doesn't look like pure coffee to me.
Science of the seventh buttonhole.
Anyone who drinks cups of coffee every day is certainly not a heavy alcoholic. Then you immediately have a lower than average mortality. A serious study would compare who drinks equal amounts of water every day, or tea for example. If that didn't happen, the design of the study was already suspicious.
Scientists are judged by the number of times their work is cited in journals and the like. The perverse consequence is that startling and even controversial results have much more impact than more serious publications with few surprises. Since funding for scientists and the institutions they are affiliated with depends on that assessment, studies are planned in advance to achieve maximum effect. The targeted limited study itself is therefore also cheaper than one that would provide truly reliable data.
Indeed, you are quite right. Similarly, you will read in another published study in 2 years that more than 4 coffees a day (cups? what size) will see your dark clouds and your rectum will writhe.
And I'm more confident about that; just look at the politicians; drink lots of coffee and are always gloomy. The reason for austerity has been scientifically explained. lol what nonsense.
Must be bean coffee and not soluble instant coffee. Then Arabica is also the best, is pure coffee. That instant coffee is mixed with cocoa and according to a producer of Nescafe Malaysia, whom I sat next to on a flight, Nescafe instant coffee is mixed up to 50% with cocoa. More than 2 cups of coffee a day is not good for your health. Want to have an optater drink it black, you can fly.