For years, questions about the health benefits of coffee have been debated, with many health experts on both sides of the issue. Recently, more and more studies have sided with researchers saying that coffee is not only healthy, but it may also add years to your life.
It has been well-documented that coffee contains many different ingredients. Altogether, there are more than 1,000 of them, and many of them contribute to the aroma and taste of it. More than 100 ingredients are biologically active and are known to promote health.
Drinking Coffee Reduces Your Overall Risk of Death
A study that took place in the UK looked at the medical records of about 450,000 people for more than 12 years. After eliminating other possible causes of death and preconditions, they found that the people who drank any kind of coffee benefited from a longer life than those who did not drink the dark liquid.
Ground coffee reduced the risk of death the most – by 27%. Decaffeinated coffee reduced death by 14%, and instant caffeinated coffee reduced it by 11%.
The Coffee with the Most Health Benefits
Go into a grocery store and you will find many different kinds of coffee. Stores selling specialty coffees and gourmet coffees offer an even wider variety.
Coffee naturally contains a lot of health benefits, including vitamins and minerals. Some of the nutrients include magnesium, niacin (B3), riboflavin (B2), potassium, and antioxidants.
How the coffee is processed and cooked determines how many health benefits each cup has in it. For instance, if you want more antioxidants, hot-brewed coffee will have more because the heat extracts more of them than cold-brewed coffee. If you prefer more caffeine to help you stay awake and alert, cold-brewed is the better choice.
The Health Conditions It Helps
Heart disease, which is the leading cause of death in the US, and stroke, which is the fifth leading cause of death, are both benefited by drinking coffee. People who drink two or three cups of coffee per day had a reduced risk of 20% for both conditions. Drinking instant coffee reduced the benefit by 9%, and those who drank decaf coffee had an even smaller reduced risk of 6%.
The ingredients in coffee can help reduce your risk of diabetes, liver disease, liver cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, irregular heartbeats (arrhythmia), prostate cancer, and more. It also helps to protect you from Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.
One ingredient in coffee – caffeine – is also linked to keeping you looking younger. Caffeine is often added to various beauty products to help keep your skin looking younger. It does this by helping keep your skin elastic and reducing free radicals with its antioxidants. It also tightens your skin because it reduces the size of your blood vessels near the skin’s surface. The benefits of caffeine in skin care are short-lived, lasting about as long as the effects of a cup of coffee.
Watch the Sugars and Creamers
Some of the benefits of drinking coffee are lost when you add a lot of sugar and coffee creamers to your drink. Too much sugar can increase your risk of diabetes and weight gain. Creamers can add a lot of fat, so go easy on them or avoid them altogether.
Because coffee in any form has various health benefits, it can help you live longer. Your longevity will increase that much more when you also eat healthy meals and exercise regularly.
