Your morning cup of java could actually help you see more mornings, a new study finds.
People who drink about three to five cups of coffee per day may be less likely to die prematurely from some illnesses than those who don’t drink coffee at all or drink less of it, a study done at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health has found.
The study, published in the online journal “Circulation,” found that moderate coffee drinkers are at lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, neurological diseases such as Parkinson’s disease, type 2 diabetes, and suicide.
The benefits applied to people who drank caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee.
“This study provides further evidence that moderate consumption of coffee may confer health benefits in terms of reducing premature death due to several diseases,” senior author Frank Hu said in a news release.
He said the findings support previous dietary guidelines that say moderate coffee consumption can be part of a healthy dietary pattern.
The authors said the key may be that bioactive compounds in coffee reduce insulin resistance and systematic inflammation.
“That could explain some of our findings. However, more studies are needed to investigate the biological mechanisms producing these effects,” said one of the authors, Ming Ding, a doctoral student in the Department of Nutrition.
The researchers poured over data from three large, ongoing studies which collectively included more than 200,000 men and women.
While moderate coffee drinkers appeared to experience a number of health benefits, the study did not find any association between coffee consumption and cancer deaths.
