Tea and coffee fight diabetes

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

DRINKING coffee and tea may protect against type 2 diabetes, research finds.

Scientists found that each additional cup of coffee drunk a day reduced type 2 diabetes risk by 7%.

People who consumed three to four cups per day had a 25% lower risk than those who drank between zero and two cups.

Study participants who drank three to four cups of tea a day had a one-fifth lower risk of diabetes than those who avoided tea.

The association did not appear to be linked to caffeine. Drinking three to four cups per day of decaffeinated coffee reduced the risk of diabetes by 33% compared with drinking no coffee.

Scientists from the University of Sydney combined results from 18 studies including 458,000 participants.

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Tuesday, December 15, 2009