5 things you might not have known about coffee ("must miss" system)
If you're a coffee lover, and who among us isn't, we have some good news.
Italian researchers report that people who drink two or three cups of coffee a day have lower blood pressure than people who drink less.
Coffee is probably the most popular drink in the world.
In 2020 and 2021, the world consumed almost 10 million tons of coffee.
Researchers have not always agreed on the health implications of the drink, but there is recent evidence to suggest that drinking coffee can lower the risk of several health conditions, such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and even neurodegenerative and liver diseases.
However, the answer to the question of what causes these benefits remains unknown.
Today we drink without guilt.
Upside down coffee (Photo: ShutterStock)
"Caffeine is only one of the several components of coffee, and certainly not the only one that has an active role. Positive effects on human health were indeed recorded even among those who consume decaffeinated coffee," explains the lead study author Arrigo Cicero, a professor in the Department of Medical Sciences and Surgery at the University of Bologna.
"We know that caffeine can increase blood pressure, but other bioactive components in coffee seem to balance this effect with a positive end result on blood pressure levels."
To figure this out, a team of researchers analyzed a sample of 720 men and 783 women from the Brisighella Heart Study.
They compared blood pressure levels, coffee consumption habits and clinical information for each person.
More in Walla!
The reason you shouldn't drink coffee on an empty stomach
To the full article
"The results are very clear: peripheral blood pressure was significantly lower in people who consumed one to three cups of coffee a day than in people who do not drink coffee," explains Prof. Cicero.
Peripheral blood pressure describes blood pressure of the body and not in large blood vessels near the heart.
"And for the first time, we were able to confirm these effects also in relation to the central aortic pressure, the one closest to the heart, where we see an almost identical phenomenon with completely similar values for those who drink coffee regularly and those who don't."
High blood pressure has a strong connection to cardiovascular disease due to the high force of the blood consistently pushing against the walls of the blood vessels, causing the heart to work harder to pump blood.
The findings from this study are valuable because they suggest another potential dietary avenue for lowering blood pressure and preventing cardiovascular disease.
"This is the first study to observe this relationship in the Italian population, and the data confirm the positive effect of coffee consumption on cardiovascular risk."
Just this month, a study was published that found that coffee with milk has properties that increase its anti-inflammatory effect.
The study from the University of Copenhagen, published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, found that the antioxidants from coffee in combination with milk proteins lead to a doubling of the anti-inflammatory properties of the immune cells.
health
Nutrition and diet
Preventive nutrition
Tags
coffee
caffeine
Blood Pressure
heart diseases