Last week, a study indicated that coffee can help protect some women from a particular type of breast cancer. And this week, a new study suggests men may also have a good reason to guzzle java.
By examining the coffee-drinking habits of 48,000 men over 20 years, U.S. researchers found that men who drank six or more eight-ounce cups of coffee a day had an 18-per-cent-lower risk of developing any form of prostate cancer, compared to men who didn't drink any coffee. The protection was greatest for lethal forms of prostate cancer, with a risk reduction of 60 per cent for men who drank the most coffee, compared to those who never touched a drop.
The results, published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, apply to both regular and decaffeinated coffee.
"Coffee contains lots of antioxidants, which may fight cancer," the lead researcher, Kathryn Wilson of Harvard Medical School in Boston, said in an e-mail. "But," she added, "there are many, many compounds in coffee, so it could be another mechanism, or combination of mechanisms."