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Addicted to coffee

Are you addicted to coffee? Do you need a reason to justify your addiction? Read on! 

Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash

I justify my coffee addiction (6-8 espresso shots per day) by claiming that I am preventing myself from developing Parkinson’s disease in the future. This is #PreventiveNeurology in practice. Sadly coffee consumption doesn’t protect you from getting Alzheimer’s disease or all-cause dementia. However, I was thrilled to note that it seems to protect you from developing chronic liver disease and dying from liver disease.


The molecular mechanisms underlying this are plausible. Caffeine is a non-selective blocker of the A2aA receptor, activation of which stimulates collagen production by hepatic stellate cells, which are the primary mediators of fibrosis. But as decaffeinated coffee is also protective it may be the other ingredients in coffee such as chlorogenic acid, kahweol and cafestol, which protect against liver fibrosis.

Whatever the mechanism underlying coffee’s protective effects on the liver, I am going to continue to drink coffee as I now have two reasons to justify my rather moderately large consumption.

Kennedy et al. All coffee types decrease the risk of adverse clinical outcomes in chronic liver disease: a UK Biobank study. BMC Public Health volume 21, Article number: 970 (2021)

Background: Chronic liver disease (CLD) is a growing cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, particularly in low to middle-income countries with high disease burden and limited treatment availability. Coffee consumption has been linked with lower rates of CLD, but little is known about the effects of different coffee types, which vary in chemical composition. This study aimed to investigate associations of coffee consumption, including decaffeinated, instant and ground coffee, with chronic liver disease outcomes.

Methods: A total of 494,585 UK Biobank participants with known coffee consumption and electronic linkage to hospital, death and cancer records were included in this study. Cox regression was used to estimate hazard ratios (HR) of incident CLD, incident CLD or steatosis, incident hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and death from CLD according to coffee consumption of any type as well as for decaffeinated, instant and ground coffee individually.

Results: Among 384,818 coffee drinkers and 109,767 non-coffee drinkers, there were 3600 cases of CLD, 5439 cases of CLD or steatosis, 184 cases of HCC and 301 deaths from CLD during a median follow-up of 10.7 years. Compared to non-coffee drinkers, coffee drinkers had lower adjusted HRs of CLD (HR 0.79, 95% CI 0.72–0.86), CLD or steatosis (HR 0.80, 95% CI 0.75–0.86), death from CLD (HR 0.51, 95% CI 0.39–0.67) and HCC (HR 0.80, 95% CI 0.54–1.19). The associations for decaffeinated, instant and ground coffee individually were similar to all types combined.

Conclusion: The finding that all types of coffee are protective against CLD is significant given the increasing incidence of CLD worldwide and the potential of coffee as an intervention to prevent CLD onset or progression.

Conflicts of Interest
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General Disclaimer: Please note that the opinions expressed here are those of Professor Giovannoni and do not necessarily reflect the positions of the Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry nor Barts Health NHS Trust and are not meant to be interpreted as personal clinical advice.
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