A new British study suggests moderate consumption of coffee and caffeine on a regular basis could be beneficial to prevent cardiometabolic diseases like type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease and stroke.
People who drank three coffee drinks per day (200-300mg of caffeine a day) had a 48.1% or 40.7% reduced risk for new-onset cardiometabolic diseases, compared with people who did not consume caffeine at all or very little per day.
The study, published in the Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, examined data from the UK Biobank, featuring health information of more than 500,000 people aged 37 to 73 – including inpatient hospital data, death registry records, primary care history and self-reported medical conditions; after eliminating people with ‘ambiguous information regarding their caffeine intake’, researchers were left with more than 360,000 people for analysis. ‘Previous studies have assessed the potential benefits of coffee, tea and caffeine, but their role in the prevention of any cardiometabolic diseases has not been clearly defined,’ noted medicalnewstoday.com.
‘This study’s results, too, suggest an association rather than a causal relationship. Nevertheless, this association may be meaningful to health, seeing people with a single cardiometabolic disease may have twice the mortality risk of those without any cardiometabolic diseases.’
Moreover, those with cardiometabolic multimorbidity (co-occurrence of cardiometabolic diseases) ‘may also have an up to 7 times higher risk of all- cause mortality’.
The researchers also noted cardiometabolic multimorbidity may present higher risks of loss of physical function and mental stress than those with single diseases.
Lead author Dr Chaofu Ke from China’s Soochow University in Suzhou commented: ‘The findings highlight that promoting moderate amounts of coffee or caffeine intake as a dietary habit to healthy people might have far- reaching benefits for the prevention of cardiometabolic multimorbidity.’
California cardiologist Dr Cheng-Han Chen from MemorialCare Saddleback Medical Center in Laguna Hills (not involved in the study) explained that, while caffeine does have some negative effects like raising blood pressure, its beneficial properties outweigh its downsides and noted: ‘Caffeine itself will stimulate the central nervous system, leading to increased blood pressure and heart rates. It is also known to affect insulin sensitivity of cells, regulation of fat turnover and blood vessel dilatation.
‘However, both coffee and tea are complex beverages that contain hundreds of bioactive compounds, and it is likely their biological effects extend beyond those of the caffeine itself.
‘Compounds such as flavonoids, alkaloids and polyphenols are thought to have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects and might be involved in glucose and lipid metabolism as well.’
He also noted this study involved ‘moderate consumption’ of coffee and caffeine.
