Coffee could reduce obesity and type 2 diabetes risks: study

Health

From Brooke Steinberg

March 15, 2023 | 9:57 a.m

Making coffee a part of your daily meal can benefit your health.

A new study published in the journal BMJ Medicine suggests that drinking coffee regularly could reduce body fat and lower your risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

The researchers wanted to find out whether coffee drinkers are safe from type 2 diabetes because of their caffeine intake or for other reasons, such as being middle class and being able to afford a healthier lifestyle.

This study looked at nearly 10,000 people with genetic traits — such as the CYP1A2 and AHR genes — that affect how the body handles caffeine intake using a statistical technique called Mendelian randomization, which is a tool that shows a relationship between a Characteristic and a result examined.

People with these genetic variants are associated with slower processing and metabolism of caffeine and typically drink less coffee, but have high levels of caffeine in their blood.

The same group of people were found to have lower body mass index, lower body fat mass, and lower risk of type 2 diabetes, obviously pointing to caffeine as the reason.

In about half of the same group of people, the lower risk of type 2 diabetes was because they had a lower BMI.

Some evidence suggests that caffeine allows the body to burn more fat and/or makes people feel full, leading them to eat less, and that being thin reduces the risk of type 2 diabetes to get sick.

About 1 in 10 Americans is affected by diabetes, and about 90% to 95% of them have type 2 diabetes, according to the CDC. Type 2 diabetes most commonly affects people over the age of 45.

“These results suggest that caffeine may be associated with a lower body mass index, less body fat, and a reduced likelihood of developing type 2 diabetes,” said Dr. Dipender Gill, lead author of the study from Imperial College London. “It may improve people’s metabolism, although that doesn’t mean people should go out and drink lots of high-calorie caffeinated beverages like chai lattes.”

An average cup of coffee contains about 70 to 150 milligrams of caffeine, and evidence shows that 100 milligrams per day can increase energy expenditure by about 100 calories per day. But coffee also contains other chemicals like diterpenes that can harm your metabolism.

The research also found that people with higher blood caffeine levels were no less likely to develop cardiovascular diseases such as stroke, heart failure, coronary artery disease, and irregular heart rhythm (atrial fibrillation).

“If there is more evidence from larger studies in the future, it could indicate that people should consider drinking espresso or black coffee to reduce their risk of type 2 diabetes,” Gill said.