26 replies to this topic

[muffeoniv]

Is coffee good or bad to drink? This study showed that people on a Greek island who drank two cups of strong coffee per day lived longer? Is drinking coffee good because of the flavanoids or bad because of caffeine?

[AgeVivo]

which study? (PMID?)

[Trevor]

Allow me to jump into the fire again. Coffee is horrible. Any amount raises cortisol, adrenaline and homocysteine. It stresses your adrenals which is why coffee drinkers have those ups and downs. It raises insulin which is a key factor in premature aging. It is nothing but pure acid that will leach minerals from your body and on and on.

Why in the world would you want to chemically stimulate your organs? Do you need more energy? Change your diet and health habits instead.

[Forever21]

Is coffee good or bad to drink? This study showed that people on a Greek island who drank two cups of strong coffee per day lived longer? Is drinking coffee good because of the flavanoids or bad because of caffeine?

If its a 200 calorie cappuccino and you've eaten 1900 calories today, then its bad.

[1kgcoffee]

It's only dangerous if you dump in chemicals and sugar, abuse it to combat stress, overconsume or have some adrenal deficiency. A little coffee is probably ok, seems to offer some protection against alzheimers and heart disease, but tea and cocoa are much better. As for caffeine, a little is probably better than none at all. It's also a mild mtor inhibitor.

[e Volution]

It's only dangerous if you dump in chemicals and sugar, abuse it to combat stress, overconsume or have some adrenal deficiency. A little coffee is probably ok, seems to offer some protection against alzheimers and heart disease, but tea and cocoa are much better. As for caffeine, a little is probably better than none at all. It's also a mild mtor inhibitor.

Do we have good dose response curve data on coffee like we do red wine?

[JLL]

Allow me to jump into the fire again. Coffee is horrible. Any amount raises cortisol, adrenaline and homocysteine. It stresses your adrenals which is why coffee drinkers have those ups and downs. It raises insulin which is a key factor in premature aging. It is nothing but pure acid that will leach minerals from your body and on and on.

Why in the world would you want to chemically stimulate your organs? Do you need more energy? Change your diet and health habits instead.

Healthy or not, coffee is fantastic. You're just hating on coffee because you don't like it. Where's the lifespan data?

Look up mild stressors and hormesis. Besides, the insulin issue is not that simple.

As in previous studies,^{<a href="http://jama.ama-assn...-JLT0310-4-1-1" style="text-decoration: none; color: rgb(51, 51, 204); ">1} we found that excessive coffee drinking was associated with other variables that suggest an unhealthy lifestyle. After controlling for these variables, however, we found that both coffee and tea consumption were related to improved insulin sensitivity.

http://jama.ama-assn...pe2=tf_ipsecsha

[Sillewater]

Considering some of the epidemiological evidence showing benefits or neutral effect for coffee drinkers I would say it is healthy. Seeing all the crap that people do put into their coffee (seen the ingredients in any Starbucks drink lately?) I'm curious as to why they aren't at more risk for diabetes. If anything they are protected.

[ajnast4r]

i think it depends on 3 things:

1) your genetic ability to process caffeine, slow processors have higher rates of certain diseases

2) moderation so as not to overstimulate and stress the cns

3) quality of the coffee. is it ground fresh, or preground and oxidized... is it organic, or pesticide laden. coffee is a heavily contaminated crop especially foreign coffee.

[Hodsdon]

This is amazing when you consider that more than half the people in the United States drink coffee regularly for most of their adult life. If coffee were beneficial (or dangerous) to life expectancy, that would be a major public health issue.

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Edited by maxwatt, 17 September 2010 - 01:23 AM.
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[Annan]

This is amazing when you consider that more than half the people in the United States drink coffee regularly for most of their adult life. If coffee were beneficial (or dangerous) to life expectancy, that would be a major public health issue.

Most things that people consume could be listed under a 'major public health issue'. We have our alcohol, cigs, wheat, processed foods, GMOs, pesticides, artificial sweeteners, etc, etc. Some would argue not all of those are problems, but I still find it mildly surprising we're not all dead yet.

Edited by Annan, 18 September 2010 - 10:28 AM.

[Lufega]

As a kid I used to watch my zombie parents wake up each morning craving, needed coffee to function. For this reason alone I never, ever touched the stuff. Plus, I read a study that a long time ago that said coffee hardened the arteries.

[jath7872]

Coffee is a good drink, but yes excessive use of anything is hazardous. Same is the case with coffee. Also, regular use of coffee prevents some of the nutrients in your food from being absorbed effectively in your small intestines, which leads to further vitamin and mineral deficiencies. I would prefer drinking coffee in a limited amount.

[Shepard]

Um, how else do you recover from all the wine you drink the night before? Gotta get them resveratrols.

[JonesGuy]

If you're more productive due to coffee, and thus more wealthy due to coffee, then it might give you a long-term benefit greater than the biological damage that it (might) cause. Real immortality is going to cost $$$$, and I want the researchers and the investors to have all the cognitive boost that they can get.

[herbaldiet]

Coffee may improve a person’s mood (at least temporarily) and risk for certain diseases — good news for coffee addicts like me. But it also appears to have some harmful effects. The ultimate verdict on coffee is still out.

[mikeinnaples]

Coffee is extremely healthy. Well at least for all the people around me in the morning.

[churchill]

I would say that it makes little difference on longevity.

[stephen_b]

Coffee is reported to deplete magnesium. That might be bad, especially given that so many are magnesium deficient.

[kismet]

Coffee is reported to deplete magnesium. That might be bad, especially given that so many are magnesium deficient.

Don't you remember or do you still disagree with the 'standard rant'? I.e. in the face of mortality or hard end point data, mechanistic speculation on said endpoint becomes largely irrelevant.

Additionally, I find this focus on mineral balance highly misleading: it's a non-point if your diet is healthy and can be solved by a 0.02$ pill otherwise.
it is the type of red herring that leads people to thinking phytates could be detrimental...

and to all those merely guessing on its effects, just skim MEDLINE for meta-analyses e.g.

Int J Cardiol. 2009 Nov 12;137(3):216-25. Epub 2008 Aug 15.
Coffee consumption and risk of coronary heart diseases: a meta-analysis of 21 prospective cohort studies.
Wu et al.
Finding no effect with one positive exception “Moderate coffee consumption showed significantly lower CHD RR (95% CI) of 0.82 (0.73-0.92) (p<0.001) in women, and of 0.87 (0.80-0.86) (p=0.001) in men and women followed <or=10 years.”

It is largely the same for cancer and neurodegenerative disorders (null or slightly positive).

The Qs of interest are more like: how is coffee prepared in most studies? Can you reduce the amount of glycotoxins and acrylamide you ingest by coffee and should you? (i.e. the benefits may be inherent to the preparation method..) would it be additive w/ green tea?

Ajna, can you cite some good studies on this point "1) your genetic ability to process caffeine, slow processors have higher rates of certain diseases"?

Edited by kismet, 04 October 2010 - 05:25 PM.

[forever freedom]

Don't if it's bad or good for longevity (and whatever the case, the effect would most likely be nearly negligible for a mild drinker). All i know is that it allows me to sleep on average 1 hour less per night (i can get an average of 6-6.5 hours long term), and that's gold.

All it takes is one big cup of coffee (and i never take more than one per day to avoid tolerance or possible addiction) at the time i start feeling sleepy which is in the beginning to mid afternoon and i'm good to go for the rest of the day as if i had all the sleep i needed. At night i never have any difficulty sleeping.

I guess it depends on the person. For some it's a perfect fit but others get all messed up with it having metabolism and sleep problems.

Edited by forever freedom, 04 October 2010 - 07:21 PM.

[Brain_Ischemia]

This is amazing when you consider that more than half the people in the United States drink coffee regularly for most of their adult life. If coffee were beneficial (or dangerous) to life expectancy, that would be a major public health issue.

Also consider the unambiguous garbage which the overwhelming majority of American coffee drinkers put into those cups every day.

Case in point:
- A single cup of Coffee, by itself, is essentially a calorie-free beverage containing modest amounts of B vitamins and minerals such as Potassium.
- Take a look at the nutrition facts for the offerings on a Starbucks menu and you'll realize that the average cup of coffee is mostly *not coffee*.

[stephen_b]

Coffee is reported to deplete magnesium. That might be bad, especially given that so many are magnesium deficient.

Don't you remember or do you still disagree with the 'standard rant'? I.e. in the face of mortality or hard end point data, mechanistic speculation on said endpoint becomes largely irrelevant.

Well, one thought that comes to mind is that a comparison (yes, controlled studies would be best but hard to get here) between coffee drinkers who are magnesium deficient and coffee drinkers who are not is needed. I agree that coffee is associated with health benefits.

[infinityXme]

Is coffee good or bad to drink? This study showed that people on a Greek island who drank two cups of strong coffee per day lived longer? Is drinking coffee good because of the flavanoids or bad because of caffeine?

Maybe they're living longer because of a peaceful existence on an idyllic island, nevermind the coffee? Personally, I don't drink coffee.

[motif]

despite of great coffee taste and smell it is healthy only in one form - anally as coffee enema.

Edited by motif, 09 November 2010 - 09:15 AM.

[Brainbox]

As previously mentioned, slow caffeine metabolism increases risk of heart attack while fast metabolism of caffeine might decrease his risk when drinking 3 cups a day.

According 23andme:

Caffeine is primarily metabolized by the liver enzyme cytochrome P450 1A2 (CYP1A2). The form of the SNP rs762551 a person has determines how fast CYP1A2 metabolizes caffeine. In this study, people with the slower version of the CYP1A2 enzyme who also drank at least two to three cups of coffee per day had a significantly increased risk of a non-fatal heart attack. The study found that fast metabolizers, on the other hand, may have actually reduced their heart attack risk by drinking coffee.

The research:

Coffee, CYP1A2 genotype, and risk of myocardial infarction.
Cornelis MC, El-Sohemy A, Kabagambe EK, Campos H.

Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Comment in:

• JAMA. 2006 Aug 16;296(7):764-5; author reply 765-6.

Abstract
CONTEXT: The association between coffee intake and risk of myocardial infarction (MI) remains controversial. Coffee is a major source of caffeine, which is metabolized by the polymorphic cytochrome P450 1A2 (CYP1A2) enzyme. Individuals who are homozygous for the CYP1A2*1A allele are "rapid" caffeine metabolizers, whereas carriers of the variant CYP1A2*1F are "slow" caffeine metabolizers.

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether CYP1A2 genotype modifies the association between coffee consumption and risk of acute nonfatal MI.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Cases (n = 2014) with a first acute nonfatal MI and population-based controls (n = 2014) living in Costa Rica between 1994 and 2004, matched for age, sex, and area of residence, were genotyped by restriction fragment-length polymorphism polymerase chain reaction. A food frequency questionnaire was used to assess the intake of caffeinated coffee.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Relative risk of nonfatal MI associated with coffee intake, calculated using unconditional logistic regression.

RESULTS: Fifty-five percent of cases (n = 1114) and 54% of controls (n = 1082) were carriers of the slow *1F allele. For carriers of the slow *1F allele, the multivariate-adjusted odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of nonfatal MI associated with consuming less than 1, 1, 2 to 3, and 4 or more cups of coffee per day were 1.00 (reference), 0.99 (0.69-1.44), 1.36 (1.01-1.83), and 1.64 (1.14-2.34), respectively. Corresponding ORs (95% CIs) for individuals with the rapid *1A/*1A genotype were 1.00, 0.75 (0.51-1.12), 0.78 (0.56-1.09), and 0.99 (0.66-1.48) (P = .04 for gene x coffee interaction). For individuals younger than the median age of 59 years, the ORs (95% CIs) associated with consuming less than 1, 1, 2 to 3, or 4 or more cups of coffee per day were 1.00, 1.24 (0.71-2.18), 1.67 (1.08-2.60), and 2.33 (1.39-3.89), respectively, among carriers of the *1F allele. The corresponding ORs (95% CIs) for those with the *1A/*1A genotype were 1.00, 0.48 (0.26-0.87), 0.57 (0.35-0.95), and 0.83 (0.46-1.51).

CONCLUSION: Intake of coffee was associated with an increased risk of nonfatal MI only among individuals with slow caffeine metabolism, suggesting that caffeine plays a role in this association.

PMID: 16522833 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

What this study does not address is the effect of milk. which in the case of tea seems to block the healthy effect of certain polyphenols. This might also be the case with coffee, but I'm not sure, Furthermore, I think this is a clear case where controversy regarding "black-box" observations can be explained by individual genetics. But also relevant is that heart attack is only one aspect of health, so controversy remains.

It doesn't stop me from drinking an occasional good espresso...

Edited by Brainbox, 09 November 2010 - 12:41 PM.

[Brainbox]

While I was looking for something else (possible link between high-nitrate containing veggies, fish and cancer incidence) I stumbled upon this study.
Any thoughts?

link

Results In gender-combined proportional hazards analyses, the consumption of fresh fruit seven or more times per week was associated with a significantly reduced risk of gastric cancer, compared to lower levels of consumption (relative hazard (RH): 0.6, 95% confidence interval (CI) : 0.4–1.0, P = 0.03). The combined intake of fresh fruit and raw vegetables was inversely associated with the risk of gastric cancer in the total cohort, and among the men (P < 0.05). No significant relationships were found between gastric cancer incidence and the intake of pickled vegetables, miso soup, dried or salted fish, or processed meats among either gender. Compared to non-drinkers, men who drank one cup of coffee per day had a significantly elevated risk of gastric cancer (RH: 2.5, 95% CI: 1.0–6.1, P = 0.05), but there was no evidence of a dose-response relationship. Cigarette smoking and consumption of alcohol were not related to gastric cancer, in analyses restricted to the men. Conclusions The results related to fruit and vegetable intake are consistent with an antinitrosating effect of these foods, while the unexpected association between coffee consumption and gastric cancer is difficult to explain and may represent a chance finding.