Is coffee good for you? The verdict is finally in

If you enjoy a steaming cup of Joe to get your morning started, I’m with you all the way — as are millions of others worldwide. According to the International Coffee Organization, we sip down 1.4 billion cups every day.

That sounds like a low estimate to me, but suffice it to say, there’s a LOT of coffee being brewed and poured every second of every day.

But… is it good for us?

Good question. And it’s a real puzzle…

I’m sure you’ve noticed the conflicting headlines. Study after study shows coffee promotes certain health benefits. But then it seems just as many reveal unhealthy downsides.

From my biased point of view, the only reasonable response to these mixed messages is to just drink up and enjoy. But that isn’t good enough for nutritional epidemiologist Giuseppe Grosso of Italy’s University of Catania.

Grosso and colleagues conducted an ambitious “umbrella review” on more than 120 meta-analyses of coffee studies. (“Umbrella reviews” are essentially “reviews of reviews,” compiling evidence from existing reviews, which provide a clearer understanding of a broad topic area.)

Some of the research they examined was observational, where volunteers reported their coffee drinking habits and allowed access to their medical records. Other studies were randomized controlled trials where coffee “doses” were portioned out or restricted.

Fortunately for coffee lovers, Grosso’s team reports almost nothing but good news for coffee lovers. They found that coffee drinking is linked with:

  • A “probable” 2 to 20 percent reduced risk of several cancers, including breast, colorectal, colon, endometrial, and prostate
  • A 5 percent reduced risk of heart disease
  • A 30 percent lower risk of type 2 diabetes and Parkinson’s disease

Coffee drinkers also had a slightly reduced risk of death from any cause while the studies were in progress.

Now, none of these results prove causation. So you can’t confidently say your daily jolt of java is putting up a reliable shield against cancer, heart disease, etc.

However, the researchers offer their thoughts on two ways that coffee is protective…

  1. Coffee beans contain phytochemicals, which are anti-inflammatory and antioxidant
  2. Phytochemicals and caffeine trigger enzymes that help regulate insulin and glucose metabolism, DNA repair, and liver function

While all of these effects land solidly in the plus column, there was one major caveat discovered in the analysis.

Evidence suggests that women should avoid coffee during pregnancy due to a “probable” link between caffeine intake and risk of miscarriage. They say fetuses are missing a critical enzyme that metabolizes caffeine. This risk isn’t certain, but the researchers feel the potential is strong enough that women should be warned.

The research also debunks two myths: that coffee might raise blood pressure and increase risk of dying of cancer.

The problem, Grosso says, is that many studies didn’t control for smoking. When smokers were removed from the data, revised results showed that coffee created a small benefit in blood pressure and slightly reduced risk of cancer death.

One thing this study won’t do is put to rest the question of how coffee affects our health. So the research is bound to continue. And I’ll be sure to keep you updated as the results come in.

For now, I’m content with Grosso’s conclusions. Time for a coffee break!

 

SOURCES

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/after-poring-over-all-the-evidence-experts-declare-coffee-is-mostly-good-for-you/2018/02/02/b45f9f8e-02d1-11e8-8acf-ad2991367d9d_story.html?undefined=&utm_term=.ad28f0468e03&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1
2/4/18
After poring over all the evidence, experts declare coffee is (mostly) good for you
Washington Post
February 4, 2018

http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev-nutr-071816-064941
Coffee, Caffeine, and Health Outcomes: An Umbrella Review
Annual Review of Nutrition
August 2017