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Maybe caffeine doesn't reduce insulin sensitivity after all - ARTICLE

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Coffee linked to lower risk of diabetes

BILTHOVEN, Netherlands, Nov 07, 2002 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Good news for coffee addicts: a new study out of the Netherlands suggests drinking several cups of coffee daily could reduce the risk for type 2 diabetes.

Researchers led by Rob van Dam of the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment conducted an observational study of 17,111 men and women ages 30 to 60.

Average coffee consumption within this group was 5.2 cups per day. The researchers found individuals who drank seven or more cups of coffee per day were 50 percent less likely to develop type 2 diabetes -- the most prevalent form of the disease -- compared to those who drank an average of two cups or fewer daily.

As reported in the Nov. 9 issue of the British journal The Lancet, this association held true even after taking into account the person's body mass index, a calculation based on height and weight, and other lifestyle habits, such as smoking and alcohol consumption. An observational study simply looks at current behavior patterns among a population and their possible connections to diseases and is not a clinical trial in which coffee drinkers are compared to non-coffee drinkers.

Caffeine has been known to reduce sensitivity to insulin, which can be harmful, van Dam explained. "However, studies that observed a reduction of insulin sensitivity only looked at the effects immediately after caffeine consumption," van Dam told United Press International. "The effects of chronic consumption may be different, as for some effects of caffeine tolerance develops."

Also, caffeine might not be the determining factor in the protective effect against diabetes, van Dam said. "We don't know yet. Possible (other) candidates include chlorogenic acid and magnesium."

He added, "We cannot completely exclude the possibility that caffeine contributed to the effect. However, an earlier study did not see an effect on blood glucose (blood sugar) when regular coffee was substituted for decaffeinated coffee."

It is possible compounds in coffee might be working together to create this effect on blood sugar levels, van Dam explained. Tea consumption was only an average of 1.8 cups in this study group, so it remains unclear whether tea could mimic this outcome.

Dr. Francine Kaufman, president of the American Diabetes Association and head of endocrinology at Children's Hospital in Los Angeles called the study "intriguing," but cautioned, "I would not run out to Starbucks and drink a bunch of coffee."

"There's no doubt that caffeine has multiple effects in the body and potentially some other compound in coffee" could be at work here, Kaufman told UPI. However, seven cups of coffee "was kind of excessive. The average person couldn't consume that much coffee and be well."

Van Dam acknowledged coffee would not be good for everyone. Coffee "that is not paper-filtered can increase your blood cholesterol concentrations," he said. Both van Dam and Kaufman agreed further research is needed to confirm these findings.

Type 2 diabetes is one of the most common diseases in the United States and is expected to rise significantly in the coming years because one of its biggest risk factors is obesity, a condition that afflicts 61 percent of the U.S. population, according to the Surgeon General's Office. Kaufman said 7 percent of all adults in America have diabetes. For every one case of type 1 diabetes, also known as juvenile diabetes, there are nine cases of type 2 diabetes, which is actually being seen more frequently among children, she said, and the disease has increased already by 33 percent in the last few years.

(Reported by Katrina Woznicki, UPI Science News, in Washington)

Copyright: Copyright 2002 by United Press International.
 
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