A Coffee Connection?

For most people coffee contributes little to overall heart disease risk. But if you’re a java junkie, keep reading. A 2001 study published in the Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that drinking four or more cups of coffee a day affects cholesterol and homocysteine levels. Researchers broke 191 healthy, nonsmoking, coffee-drinking volunteers aged 24 to 69 into three groups: no coffee, one to three cups a day, or more than four cups a day. Those who cut out the brew altogether saw their homocysteine and cholesterol levels drop,

Another study, published in the same journal, found that in adults who drank strong filtered coffee, homocysteine levels rose 18 percent. Researchers concluded that if you’re used to drinking four or more cups of coffee a day, abstaining might reduce by 10 percent the risk of heart disease attributed to high homocysteine levels