Coffee in the morning could lower your chances of heart disease: Study

It could make that morning coffee taste a bit sweeter, with a new study showing that a cuppa could lower chances of heart disease.

The study coming out of Louisiana says that people who drink coffee in the morning are 16 per cent less likely to die earlier of any cause and 31 per cent less likely to die of cardiovascular disease in particular. It compares coffee drinkers with people who don’t drink coffee at all.

“Our findings indicate that it’s not just whether you drink coffee or how much you drink, but the time of day when you drink coffee that’s important,” said lead author of the study, Lu Qi. “We don’t typically give advice about timing in our dietary guidance, but perhaps we should be thinking about this in the future.”

The team says the previous research has already pointed to the fact that drinking coffee does not raise the risk of heart disease, even protecting against conditions such as Type 2 diabetes. They say that the intention of the study was to focus specifically on the time of day that people drank coffee, along with any effects on possible risks of developing diseases.

The study followed more than 40,000 adults in the United States through a long-term study examining health, nutrition, and lifestyle. It says more than a third (36 per cent) of participants that took part were morning coffee drinkers and around 14 per cent were all-day coffee drinkers.

Those in the study were tracked for nearly a decade, with scientists concluding that higher coffee intake amounts were “significantly” associated with a lower risk of earlier death, but only people who drank coffee in the morning.

“A possible explanation is that consuming coffee in the afternoon or evening may disrupt circadian rhythms and levels of hormones such as melatonin,” said Qi. “This, in turn, leads to changes in cardiovascular risk factors such as inflammation and blood pressure. Further studies are needed to validate our findings in other populations.”

Professor Thomas Lüscher, from the Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals in London, said many all-day drinkers suffer from sleep disturbances as well.

“Overall, we must accept the now substantial evidence that coffee drinking, particularly in the morning hours, is likely to be healthy,” said Lüscher. “Thus, drink your coffee, but do so in the morning.”