Coffee & Lung Disease

Coffee. Joe. Java. Whatever you call it, 54% of Americans drink it everyday. While experts warn that there’s definitely such a thing as too much, they also agree that coffee may actually help boost your health.

In fact, new research now suggests that people who drink at least a cup a day have a lower risk of liver cancer:

• People who said they drank one to three cups of coffee a day had a 29 percent reduced risk

• People who regularly had more than four cups of coffee a day had a 42 percent reduced risk

What researchers don’t yet understand is how coffee helps fight cancer cells.

“That’s what everybody wants to know,” said study author V. Wendy Setiawan, an assistant professor in the department of preventive medicine at the USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center in Los Angeles.

Setiawan says coffee has close to 100 active compounds including antioxidants, polyphenols and caffeine. It’s also known to affect liver enzymes.

“At this time, I don’t think anybody has any idea what compound is protective,” she said.