Morning coffee protects heart health, study finds

People who get their coffee hit in the morning reap benefits not seen in those having it later, according to the first major study into the health benefits of the drink at different times.

- Ian Sample

Analysis of the consumption by more than 40,000 adults found that morning coffee drinkers were 16% less likely to die of any cause and 31% less likely to die from cardiovascular disease during a 10-year follow-up period than those who went without.

But the benefits to heart health seemed to vanish in people who drank coffee throughout the day, the researchers found, with medical records showing no significant reduction in mortality for all-day drinkers compared with the coffee-averse.

"It's not just whether you drink coffee or how much you drink, but the time of day when you drink coffee that's important," said Dr Lu Qi, an expert in nutrition and epidemiology at Tulane University in New Orleans. "We don't typically give advice about timing in our dietary guidance, but perhaps we should be thinking about this in the future."