A cup of coffee (or 4) every day could help extend your life

COFFEE IS already a wondrous elixir capable of inspiring modern humans to move forward each day, whether that menas tapping keyboards, digging ditches, and hauling ourselves to the gym.

So it’s no surprise, then, that coffee has become become a researcher’s dream. Study after study has shown that coffee is full of antioxidants, minerals, and other compounds that can benefit our health while keeping us alert and on top of our work.

Now, the scientific community has produced another round of research-backed applause for your favorite morning beverage. Drinking three to four cups of coffee every day has been linked to a decreased risk of an early death and lower risk of a few cancers, liver disease, diabetes, and dementia, according to a new meta-analysis of 201 studies published in The BMJ. Though the studies they perused were observational studies—the evidence isn’t considered very strong by scientific standards—the researchers still found that coffee drinkers who downed three cups a day had consistently lower risk of early death from all causes and heart disease compared to those who didn’t coffee. The rates of cancers like prostate, endometrial, skin, and liver was also lower for the coffee lovers, as well as type-2 diabetes and liver diseases like cirrhosis. People who consumed coffee every day also had lower incidences of Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and dementia.

The only downside they found in the reams of studies was that regular consumption had a small increase in broken bones in women and that it may lead to problems for pregnant women like low birth weight and premature birth. The authors stated that: “Coffee drinking appears safe within usual patterns of consumption” and that randomized trials should be performed “to understand whether the key observed associations are causal.”

by Adam Bible