Next time you settle in with a cup of coffee as big as your head to get through a workday, don't apologize. Instead, feel virtuous, because a new study proves that coffee and tea are among the beverages that can stave off cancer.
A large study published in the Journal of Nutrition analyzed data from 189,000 participants and found that diets rich in vegetables, fruit, protein, and whole grains protect against many types of cancer, but regularly drinking unsweetened coffee and tea offered the strongest protective effect.
Researchers followed participants for an average of nine years and kept track of who developed cancer and who died from it. Specifically, people who drank more than two cups of unsweetened coffee a day had a 5% lower risk of getting cancer and an 11% lower risk of dying from it.
Unsweetened tea drinkers had a 6% lower chance of getting cancer and a 16% lower chance of dying from it.
To no one's surprise, higher intakes of sugar and processed foods increased risk.
But while processed food is loaded with preservatives and artificial sweeteners, researchers have found many times over that coffee and tea are rich in beneficial phytonutrients that can help lower inflammation and oxidative stress in the body. And it's the lowering of inflammation that appears to influence cancer development.
And when it comes to added sugars in any beverage, it had a specific effect on one type of cancer, the study found.
"Notably, the sugar content of coffee and tea had the most pronounced effect on risk of respiratory system cancers," the authors wrote, adding "Beverage selection significantly impacts cancer incidence and mortality. For cancer prevention, unsweetened tea or coffee may be the optimal choice."
