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I find this result surprising. Caffeine restricts blood vessels, so you'd expect blood pressure to go up the more you consume, and likewise you'd expect long-te

• chmod775 9y ago
  Only 13% of CVD deaths are caused by elevated blood pressure, and that is elevated blood pressure as a long-term condition, not the temporarily elevated blood pressure coffee may cause.
  • capisce 9y ago
    Just a speculation, maybe the temporary slightly elevated blood pressure from coffee is actually beneficial due to hormesis, just like stressing the body with strength or interval training is healthy in the long run as the body adapts and grows stronger.
• aportnoy 9y ago
  It very well may be that income is a confounding variable. Being able to afford 3-5 cups/day means you’re more likely to have a relatively high income, and thus a better health situation.
  • hn_throwaway_99 9y ago
    > Being able to afford 3-5 cups/day means you’re more likely to have a relatively high income. This is false: http://news.gallup.com/poll/184388/americans-coffee-consumption-steady-few-cut-back.aspx http://news.gallup.com/poll/184388/americans-coffee-consumpt... ”Fewer lower-income than higher-income Americans drink coffee, but lower-income coffee drinkers consume more cups per day than higher-income coffee drinkers (3.8 vs. 2.4 cups, on average)."
    • loeg 9y ago
      Does that include the entire lower-income population, or just those who drink coffee? I'm not sure I follow how those statistics disprove the parent comment suggestion that higher income people might be more likely to drink coffee.
    • xorfish 9y ago
      Wouldn't that match this study? Low income Americans driink either a lot or not any coffee at all. High income Americans drink some coffee. So you would expect no coffee consumption and high coffee consumption to correlate with a higher risk than moderate consumption. This is exactly what the study found.
  • iamthirsty 9y ago
    Do you have any source on that? I drink 3-5 cups a day and make basically nothing, and have an unrelated autoimmune disease.
  • Deimorz 9y ago
    I'm not sure if you're only thinking about buying pre-made coffee from convenience stores, Starbucks, etc. but coffee is very cheap to make yourself. It should only be cents a day unless you're using pretty high-end stuff. Also, when it says 3-5 cups a day, that's the measurement unit "cup", not what most people would think of as "a cup of coffee". A typical size cup/mug of coffee is usually about 3-4 cups.
    • jey 9y ago
      A cup is 8 fl oz, so a typical mug is 1.5 to 2 cups.
    • noncoml 9y ago
      A cup in the study is defined as 8oz of brewed coffee I believe. If you are an espresso drinker, it’s worth mentioning that a cup of brewed coffee contains almost 50% more caffeine than a single shot espresso. So we are talking about roughly 2-4 double shot espresso coffees per day.
  • deleted 9y ago
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  • nether 9y ago
    5 cups/day isn't exactly breaking the bank, as long you're not drinking hipster sour watery stuff at $4.50/cup. I just drank instant coffee throughout college. At my high school, you could drop $10 into a jar for the "coffee club" and have unlimited coffee throughout the year (drip brew, pretty weak stuff).
  • WalterBright 9y ago
    > Being able to afford 3-5 cups/day means you’re more likely to have a relatively high income You can buy a coffee maker for $12 on Amazon. Ground coffee is $7 for 12 oz or so, and you can make a pot of coffee (12 cups) a day for a couple weeks from that. It's pretty durn cheap. It's probably the cheapest beverage other than tap water.
  • gruturo 9y ago
    First time I was out of Italy I literally could not believe the price of coffee. And people could not believe me, when I told them how much cheaper it was in Italy. We’re talking 40 cents vs $2 (recent example I remember both prices for the same year, circa 2011). So yeah - depends on the country, or whether you make it yourself, coffee can be extremely cheap. No correlation between consumption and wealth (esp. in countries like Italy where literallly everyone drinks it)
    • eecc 9y ago
      In Italy bar personnel tends to be paid next to nothing for grueling shifts... it’s really incredible. But yeah, outside of tourist trap areas, your average caffè (that’d be the espresso) is usually around 80c
    • lancebeet 9y ago
      In Italy, the cost of the coffee as a service is much lower than in the rest of Europe and the USA. Espressos are made much faster and more frequently, the volume is lower which means they can be drunk quicker, and Italians generally spend less time in the cafe. Not to mention that in most of Europe, Italian coffee is served, which is more expensive there than in Italy. Even so, the cost of the actual coffee is only around 10 cents for quality beans.
      • lostlogin 9y ago
        You probably noticed that you pay more if you sit down. Drink at the bar and it’s usually cheaper.
    • deleted 9y ago
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• hackerfromthefu 9y ago
  Could it be caused from lifestyle factors that change with coffee. the first examples that come to mind: Coffee decreases appetite, which could reduce overeating, which could be linked to the noted reduction in type 2 diabetes which can be caused by eating too much sugar. Similarly could it be that coffee increases activity which if used for exercise both reduces weight as well as improves the body's ability to manage blood pressure?
• hackerfromthefu 9y ago
  When you're flagging in the afternoon, possibly the best results from a health perspective could be to rest for a bit to let your body naturally regulate, or to do some brief but intense exercise to activate adrenals naturally, or eat a lighter or low carb lunch so there's less of a blood sugar drop-off. Love to see a double blind with these alternatives measured against the extra coffees.
  • wbeckler 9y ago
    The problem is, you can't do a blind study with diet and exercise, because the subjects will know what they are doing. You could potentially do a caffeine pill study rather than a coffee study, but even that is hard to keep people from detecting. On top of this, we're looking at long term studies that would be really hard to control. Finally, the correlations noticed by these authors need to be taken with a huge grain of salt because there are so many potential confounding factors, such as income.
    • eecc 9y ago
      Plus, who knows if it’s the caffeine in the coffee or some other molecule floating in the brew. In doubt, I’ll keep my moka close and well in use ;)
  • at-fates-hands 9y ago
    >> or to do some brief but intense exercise to activate adrenals naturally I used this approach in college since I was not a coffee drinker. If I needed to study all night, or even for a few hours after a long day, I would work out either with some interval cardio or some light weight lifting. It would easily wake me up and keep me going for at least 2-3 hours and I was able to focus rather easily and there was no crash from caffeine or energy drinks that are so popular now.
• vixen99 9y ago
  Coffee is a lot more than just its caffeine. https://www.ift.org/~/media/Knowledge%20Center/Publications/Books/Samples/IFTPressBook_Coffee_PreviewChapter.pdf https://www.ift.org/~/media/Knowledge%20Center/Publications/....