Coffee drinking may protect the heart

By Calvin Palmer

As regular readers will know, I am a coffee and cigarettes man. The cigarettes may well have little in the way of beneficial effects, apart from being pleasurable, but it would appear that caffeine affords some protection for my heart.

Researchers in California have discovered that regular coffee drinkers are less likely to be admitted to hospital with irregular heartbeats, or arrhythmia as it is known, and the more coffee they drink a day, the less likely there are to suffer from the condition.

A study by Kaiser Permanente’s Division of Research, in Oakland, has found that coffee in all but very high doses affords some protection from heart disease and conditions.

Cardiologist Dr Arthur Klatsky and his team followed 130,054 men and women, aged 18 to 90, and found that those who drank four or more cups of coffee each day had an 18 per cent lower risk of hospitalization for heart rhythm disturbances.

Those who reported drinking one to three cups each day had a seven per cent reduction in risk compared to abstainers.

The differences held up even when the scientists accounted for smoking status, gender, weight, cardiac history, education and other differences between the groups.

Dr Klatsky told the American Heart Association’s 50th Annual Conference in San Francisco that while his findings did not automatically suggest that coffee alone was responsible for the link, they did appear to show coffee did no harm.

“The association does not prove cause and effect, or that coffee has a protective effect,” Dr Klatsky said. “However, these data might be reassuring to people who drink moderate amounts of coffee that their habit is not likely to cause a major rhythm disturbance.”

His results follow other research showing that coffee appears to have a protective effect on the heart.

A report from the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, in Spain, showed that drinking three cups of coffee a day could reduce the risk of women dying from heart disease by a quarter.

Another study showed that men who drank five or more cups of coffee were 44 per cent less likely to die from the disease.

Last week, epidemiologist Yangmei Li, of the University of Cambridge, in England, reported that people who drink coffee are nearly one-third less likely than nondrinkers to develop a stroke.

Previous studies have found evidence suggesting that coffee improves insulin sensitivity in the body, which would be protective against type 2 diabetes, Li said.

While other suggests that coffee components may act as anti-inflammatory agents and have antioxidant effects.

Although her study establishes an association between coffee drinking and fewer strokes, Li said it does not provide information on these potential mechanisms of action.

All I need now is research showing tobacco can ward off some disease or other and I will be laughing all the way to my grave. However, I doubt such results would ever see the light of day due to the power of the anti-smoking lobby. Still, it would diffuse the red herring of raising state taxes on tobacco to reduce healthcare costs.

[Based on reports by The Daily Telegraph and Science News.]

Starbucks announces 300 stores to close with loss of 6,700 jobs

By Calvin Palmer

Starbucks customers may have to travel further to get their favorite latte as 2009 unfolds.  The coffee company today confirmed it is closing 300 underperforming stores, 200 of them in the United States.

In job terms, it could mean shedding 6,700 positions, as the company tries to counter falling consumer demand.

The company’s Seattle headquarters will see between 300 and 350 employees depart, with effect from mid-February.  Globally, 700 non-store employees will be laid off.

This year, Starbucks hopes to increase its cost savings from a previously announced $400 million to $500 million. Same-store sales were down 9 percent for the first quarter of 2009.

Chief executive Howard Schultz has asked the compensation committee to reduce his base salary to less than $10,000 per year. Starbucks will also sell one of its corporate jets, leaving it with one.

“We are working hard to navigate both a deteriorating global economy and the restructuring of our business,” Schultz said in an e-mail to employees today.

Starbucks had at least four rounds of layoffs in 2008, including 220 in February, 100 in June, 550 in July and 135 between November and January.

The company also lost an undetermined number of employees through the planned closure of 616 underperforming U.S. stores.
Starbucks annual profit of $315.5 million in 2008 was less than half of what it was in 2007.

Despite the company’s woes, Starbucks 2008 revenue grew 10 percent to $10.4 billion — proving that there’s still a large market for specialty coffee, though that market seems to be shrinking or growing slower.

[Based on a report by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.]

Smoke gets in your eyes but coffee staves off dementia

By Calvin Palmer

Cigarettes and coffee have been part of my life for more years than I can remember.  The two go together in perfect harmony and fire me up for the day.  After a mug of coffee and three cigarettes, I am ready to take on anything a harsh world can throw at me.

And that first nicotine and caffeine rush is maintained throughout the day.  My daily consumption amounts to five cups of coffee and a pack of cigarettes.  To the health fascists, I am the devil incarnate for enjoying these simple pleasures.

And before members of the new SS, the white-coated Stethoscope Sirens, get on my case, I would never encourage anyone to take up smoking.  I simply ask that those who do smoke be allowed to enjoy a cigarette at places where cups of coffee are sold, outside a restaurant or café is just fine by me.

Given my enjoyment of coffee, I was pleased to learn that a team of Swedish and Danish researchers have concluded that drinking coffee in mid-life can help prevent the onset of dementia later in life.  So as the years advance, I may well become poorer and poorer but at least I will have my wits about me.

This conclusion was based on a study that tracked coffee consumption in a group of 1,409 middle-age men and women for an average of 21 years. During that time, 61 participants developed dementia, 48 with Alzheimer’s disease.

After controlling for numerous socioeconomic and health factors, including high cholesterol and high blood pressure, the scientists found that the subjects who had reported drinking three to five cups of coffee daily were 65 percent less likely to have developed dementia, compared with those who drank two cups or less.

People who drank more than five cups a day also were at reduced risk of dementia, the researchers said, but there were not enough people in this group to draw statistically significant conclusions.

The research was published this month in The Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

Dr. Miia Kivipelto, an associate professor of neurology at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm and lead author of the study, said:  “This is an observational study. We have no evidence that for people who are not drinking coffee, taking up drinking will have a protective effect.”

She suggest several possibilities for why coffee might reduce the risk of dementia later in life. First, earlier studies have linked coffee consumption with a decreased risk of type 2 diabetes which in turn has been associated with a greater risk of dementia. In animal studies, caffeine has been shown to reduce the formation of amyloid plaques in the brain, one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease. Finally, coffee may have an antioxidant effect in the bloodstream, reducing vascular risk factors for dementia.

Previous studies have shown that coffee drinking may also be linked to a reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease.

All I need now is research that shows cigarette smoking and second-hand smoke have beneficial effects for some other malaise.

Wouldn’t it be great if cigarette smoking and passive smoking helped clear up hemorrhoids and even prevented the affliction?

In the remake of The Ladykillers (2004) by the Coen brothers, the character of Marva Munson, played delightfully by Irma P.Hall, recounts that her late husband said, “There are only two kinds of people in the world: those with hemorrhoids and those about to get them.”

If cigarette smoke were found both to cure and prevent hemorrhoids, state and city legislators would overturn the anti-smoking legislation introduced in recent years as fast as they could take the cap off a tube of Preparation H.

I guess that is what is called a pipe dream.  Oh well, time for coffee and a cigarette.

[Based on a report by The New York Times.]