Caffeine May Reduce Body Fat and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes, Study Suggests (theguardian.com) 62
Having high levels of caffeine in your blood may lower the amount of body fat you carry and reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes, research suggests. From a report: The findings could lead to calorie-free caffeinated drinks being used to reduce obesity and type 2 diabetes, though further research is required, the researchers wrote in the BMJ Medicine journal. Dr Katarina Kos, a senior lecturer in diabetes and obesity at the University of Exeter, said the research showed potential health benefits for people with high levels of caffeine their blood, but added: "It does not study or recommend drinking more coffee, which was not the purpose of this research."
She said any caffeinated drinks containing sugar and fat would offset the positive effects. The researchers said their work built on previously published research, which suggested that drinking three to five daily cups of coffee, containing an average 70-150mg of caffeine, was associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. As those were observational studies, they made it difficult to pinpoint whether the effects were because of caffeine or other compounds, the researchers said. This latest study used a technique known as Mendelian randomisation, which establishes cause and effect through genetic evidence. The team found two common gene variants associated with the speed of caffeine metabolism, and used these to work out genetically predicted blood caffeine levels and whether this was associated with lower BMI and body fat.
She said any caffeinated drinks containing sugar and fat would offset the positive effects. The researchers said their work built on previously published research, which suggested that drinking three to five daily cups of coffee, containing an average 70-150mg of caffeine, was associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. As those were observational studies, they made it difficult to pinpoint whether the effects were because of caffeine or other compounds, the researchers said. This latest study used a technique known as Mendelian randomisation, which establishes cause and effect through genetic evidence. The team found two common gene variants associated with the speed of caffeine metabolism, and used these to work out genetically predicted blood caffeine levels and whether this was associated with lower BMI and body fat.
Coffee will save me (Score:4, Funny)
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I don't mix any shit into my coffee. Gonna live forever!
Re: Coffee will save me (Score:3)
Irish Coffee For The Win (Score:2)
I mean not only will it save you, it will leave you happy to be alive as well.
Diet sodas? (Score:2)
You're saying that diet soda is not bad? What will they think of next?
Ah, but the carbonization must be bad for us, right?
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So you can't have anything "sweet", because it's either "sugar" or "artificial sweeteners", and they already said sugar was bad.
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Anything good is not good.
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You are referring to double plus un-good?
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You're probably diabetic or prediabetic. Shouldn't feel any different after consuming sugar.
Re:Diet sodas? (Score:5, Informative)
The dose makes the poison.
You can have some sugar in your diet, and even some artificial sweeteners. Too much is the problem. And it is very easy to get too much, as quite a lot of what we buy at the grocery store is loaded with both.
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Am I allowed uncarbonated caffeine free ice?
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Make sure it's not too pure and limit the amount or you'll really mess up your osmotic balance.
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Caffeine. What can't it do? (Score:5, Funny)
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This health benefit doesn't not put a halo around caffeine. It is still addictive, tolerance-building, and has many harmful side effects when the dosage gets high. So, like most things in the real world, it has some good aspects and some bad aspects and cannot accurately be summed up as simply "good" or "bad." It's both, amount matters, details matter.
Re:Caffeine. What can't it do? (Score:5, Funny)
"It does not study or recommend drinking more coffee, which was not the purpose of this research."
Screw that, I read the headline and it screamed "Drink More Coffee".
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It has also been shown to reduce the risk of murdering co-workers early in the morning.
The key word here being "reduce" - not "eliminate".
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FTFY.
Love the snake chasing its own tail.... (Score:2)
I mean.... caffeine found to reduce body fat and risk of diabetes. Most drinks with caffeine already contain a lot of sugar. So advise drinking "zero calorie" drinks with caffeine added. Zero calorie drinks would generally contain artificial sweeteners/flavors found to cause numerous negative health side-effects, like increasing hunger and weight gain!
https://www.npr.org/sections/h... [npr.org]
Re:Love the snake chasing its own tail.... (Score:4, Informative)
Drink coffee or tea. Add some milk if you want.
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I hate coffee, it honestly makes me ill, and not fond of tea. If those are my only choices then it's water for me. I would kick the diet coke thing but it's my only source of caffeine. There are energy drink water enhancers, but it also has the fake sugar. I do go in cycles, I cut down lots and then there's some big project I'm on and I drink more.
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I hate coffee, it honestly makes me ill, and not fond of tea. If those are my only choices then it's water for me.
Caffeine tablets are available over the counter. Well-defined dose, no added sugar. You could eat one, then wash it down with that glass of water.
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Add some milk if you want.
Or not [9buz.com].
Re:Love the snake chasing its own tail.... (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean.... caffeine found to reduce body fat and risk of diabetes. Most drinks with caffeine already contain a lot of sugar.
??
Coffee only has "a lot of sugar" if you put a lot of sugar in it.
(likewise tea)
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Zero calorie drinks would generally contain artificial sweeteners/flavors found to cause numerous negative health side-effects, like increasing hunger and weight gain!
Yep, you drink some diet coke and then all the sudden those damn donuts just start cramming themselves down your throat and there's nothing you can do to stop it! Let's totally ignore the possibility that people who possess the willpower to give up sweetened beverages might also be better at sticking to other aspects of their diet regimen.
There may very well be a psychological aspect to tasting something sweet and wanting to subsequently stuff your face, but that's not the fault of the artificial sweetener
- fat would offset the positive effects - (Score:3, Informative)
Citation needed. She is repeating a mantra that has brought ill health for 60 years. I want to see a recent respectable study that shows this to be true. Goddammit stop the lies! Fat is a crucial nutrient.
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This article has nothing at all to do with dietary fat.
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They weren’t suggesting the fat was unhealthy from a nutritional perspective, merely that it would offset the caloric benefits provided by the caffeine. They found that 100 mg of caffeine led to roughly 100 extra calories being burned per day, so drinking something like a latte might be a wash: the caloric benefit provided by the caffeine gets erased by the calories in the drink itself.
Caffeine is good again. (Score:2)
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“It does not study or recommend drinking more coffee, which was not the purpose of this research.”
So, caffeine reduces body fat and diabetes risk but it could be bad for other things out of the study scope. It's an important nuance.
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Like ruin your kidneys? Or cause heart problems? Or disrupt sleep patterns?
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Or disrupt sleep patterns?
Yeah, unless you've built up a crazy tolerance to caffeine and keep your consumption consistent, it will fuck up your sleep schedule. Not sure what lack of sleep does for the likelihood of getting diabeetus (Wilford Brimley intensifies), but I can't imagine it ending well.
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Que the caffeine is bad for you articles for tomorrow.
It is for me. Gives me allergies to other things. No caffeine the allergies go away. Get caffeine by accident and they come back.
Work out by flexing capillaries? (Score:1)
calorie-free caffeinated drinks (Score:2)
Coffee. Coffee is a calorie-free caffeinated drink.
Correlation vs Causation? (Score:5, Insightful)
A more appropriate summary would be..."eat less calories than you burn and you'll have lower body fat and risk of type 2 diabetes. Drink more caffeine and you can more easily eat less calories"
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I don't believe they isolated caffeine as the cause. Caffeine is a natural appetite suppressant. Of course your body fat goes down when you eat less.
Isn’t that like suggesting it’s your body, not the vaccine for X, that’s keeping you from getting illness X? Sure, it’s true in the sense that it’s your immune system doing the fighting, but if the one leads to the other, especially so with high probability, that looks an awful lot like a causal relationship.
Caffeine + Diet is 2 part solution, vaccine is 1 (Score:2)
I don't believe they isolated caffeine as the cause. Caffeine is a natural appetite suppressant. Of course your body fat goes down when you eat less.
Isn’t that like suggesting it’s your body, not the vaccine for X, that’s keeping you from getting illness X? Sure, it’s true in the sense that it’s your immune system doing the fighting, but if the one leads to the other, especially so with high probability, that looks an awful lot like a causal relationship.
Definitely a reasonable point, but here's why I think it's incorrect. Fat loss is due to your actions, which are made easier by a drug. If you do not take the appropriate actions. If you consume the same amount of calories, your body fat will largely be the same (caffeine boosts your metabolism, but only by a very tiny bit in real caloric sense). If you drink 10 cups of coffee a day for 2 weeks, but eat an extra 1000-2000 calories each day over what you consume, your body fat will definitely go up.
I
Still trying to find the original paper (Score:3)
It's not on Sci-Hub yet...
Larsson, S. C., et al. (2023) Appraisal of the causal effect of plasma caffeine on adiposity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease: two sample mendelian randomisation study. BMJ Medicine. doi.org/10.1136/bmjmed-2022-000335.
Caffeine isn't always the solution (Score:2)
Diet pills have used caffeine for weight loss for years. And honestly anyone who knows a meth head can see how stimulants can reduce body fat. However, stimulants (like caffeine) can have some nasty long-term side effects, including chemical addiction.
In mice ? (Score:1)
.../ meta study /..
Coders drink coffee (Score:4, Funny)
therefor caffeine intake improves aptitude for computer programming.
Logically it follows that to reduce youth delinquency rates, pumping the adhd kids with coffee day to night will turn them into gainfully employed software engineers.
Brilliant!
Science And Diet (Score:3)
"It does not study or recommend drinking more coffee, which was not the purpose of this research."
No, this was done by science nerds. Clearly the purpose was drinking more Mountain Dew, while eating chips and Twinkees to see the effect on diabetes.
Seriously, though. Caffeine in the blood sometimes correlates to reduced body fat. OK, how does it correlate to nerve damage and renal damage and heart failure?
Still possibly interesting as basic science in physiology. But definitely not any diet recommendation.
We already know (Score:2)
> The findings could lead to calorie-free caffeinated drinks being used to reduce obesity and type 2 diabetes
I know how to reduce obesity and type 2 diabetes, and I don't need to wait for this or any other study. Also, no coffee necessary.
1. Regular physical exercise
2. Basic education in nutrition (because hey... guess what? It's important *what* you eat, and when)
This is yet another attempt by humans to invent something to solve a problem in a way that require 0 physical effort. And to monetize it.
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There are all sorts of Chinese / Japanese teas which have caffine and practically zero calories.
Have been drinking oolong tea often over the pass decade or so. And I know the stuff has zero calories listed. And does not even have a hint of sweetness when you drink it. Also had ayataka tea (this is Japanese) and a bunch of other similar stuff over the years. All zero calorie or very low calories.
Maybe there are variations which add sugar in the drinks, but I don't really bother with those.
Did the coffee companies (Score:3)
Yay (Score:2)
Let's celebrate by having another can of Red Bull.
Study sugests study reduces risk of beatings (Score:2)
From caffeine users who take poorly to being sanctioned in any way or form for consuming caffeine.
Need to up my cups of coffee ! (Score:2)
Moderating caffeine intake (Score:3)
Occasionally I really just want the flavor of coffee (I really like the taste of decent coffee), so there are a few decaf brands I've found have a tolerable taste for me: Dunkin Donuts, Biggby, McDonalds in roughly that order (I'm sure there are others that are good or even better, but I don't have a huge selection where I live). If I'm going to a coffee shop like Biggby (there's one close to me), I'll often ask them to give me a small with half regular half decaf, or even 2:1 decaf to regular.
So... Red Bull really does give you wings? (Score:2)
Well, not literally, but you will feel lighter.
That is a massive dosage of caffeine... (Score:2)
If you put sugar in your coffee, you probably negate all positive effects this may have immediately.
Use Paper Filters, Save Yourself The Heart Attack. (Score:2)