The Hindu Business Line : `Coffee in moderate quantities good for health'

PROMOTING COFFEE: Ernesto Illy (left), Honorary President, illycaffe S.p.A, and Sylvia Robert Sargeant of the International Coffee Organisation, at the India International Coffee Festival 2007 in Bangalore on Sunday. — G.R.N. Somashekar

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Bangalore Feb. 25 Coffee, like wine, is excellent for health if taken in moderate quantities; in excess, both coffee and wine are not so good for health," said Ernesto Illy, Honorary President, illycaffe S.p.A, at the India International Coffee Festival 2007 here on Sunday. Addressing delegates on the health benefits of coffee at the `Positively coffee' session, he said, "Drink coffee, but not too much, to keep your brain's alertness at the highest level."

Coffee effect

He added that the campaign against caffeine has taken a lot of people away from coffee, but now scientific studies on the effect of coffee on health have shown that there are many health benefits that coffee brings with it.

Recent scientific studies aligned with moderate coffee consumption have brought out the positive effects of coffee on health, said Sylvia Robert Sargeant of the International Coffee Organisation (ICO). She co-ordinates ICO's `Positively Coffee' newsletter, that makes available ready-to-use articles and newsletters on the positive aspects of coffee consumption.

This newsletter was launched in 2001, she said, to help coffee sectors around the world counter misconceptions about coffee and health.

Highlighting the positive effects of coffee on health, Jaakko Tuomilehto, National Public Health Institute, University of Helsinki, Finland, said that coffee helps reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes in people through the results of a study that he had conducted to determine the relationship between coffee consumption and the incidence of type 2 diabetes among Finnish people, who have the highest coffee consumption in the world. He said that the study concluded that coffee drinking has a graded inverse association with the risk of type 2 diabetes.

P.C. Kesavan, DAE Homi Bhabha Chair and Distinguished Fellow, MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, explained how caffeine helps protect people against the damage of radiation.

"Coffee beans is a powerhouse of antioxidants," he said, adding that no other substance has such high levels of antioxidants as coffee.

Jayarama, Director of Research, Coffee Board, who was also the moderator of the session, said that there are about 20,000 study papers on coffee and caffeine today.

"In recent years, improved scientific methods have helped unmask the myth that caffeine has an ill-effect on people's health," he said.