The Association Between Coffee Consumption and Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease in the South Korean General Population.

SCOPE: To identify the cross-sectional and prospective association between coffee consumption and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) among South Korean adults. METHODS AND RESULTS: Participants are selected from the Health Examinees study. NAFLD is defined using three non-invasive indexes: fatty liver index (FLI), hepatic steatosis index, and fibrosis-4 calculator (FIB-4). In the cross-sectional analysis, higher habitual coffee consumption is associated with a lower risk for NAFLD, define using the FLI, (men, odds ratio [OR] 0.702; women, OR 0.810) compared with non-consumers. Participants who consumed coffee with sugar and creamer also have a lower risk for NAFLD, defined using the FIB-4, compared with non-coffee-consumers (men, OR 0.739; women, OR 0.807). A prospective analysis indicated that higher coffee consumption is associated with a lower incidence of NAFLD, defined using the FLI, in men (hazard ratio, 0.706). In both men and women, a lower FIB-4 index score is associated with higher coffee consumption regardless of coffee type (all p-value <0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Coffee consumption of >3 cups per day has a protective effect against the development of NAFLD to a certain extent, and a negative association is found between coffee consumed with sugar and creamer and the FIB-4 index score in South Korean adults.

Association of Coffee Consumption and Its Types According to Addition of Sugar and Creamer with Metabolic Syndrome Incidence in a Korean Population from the Health Examinees (HEXA) Study.

Coffee is widely consumed worldwide, and numerous studies indicate that coffee consumption may potentially affect the development of chronic diseases. Metabolic syndrome (MetS) may constitute a risk factor for chronic diseases. We aimed to prospectively evaluate the association between coffee consumption and MetS incidence. All participants were selected from the Health Examinees study. MetS was defined by the Adult Treatment Panel III criteria of the National Cholesterol Education Program. A multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression model was used to assess the relationship between coffee consumption and MetS incidence. In comparison with non-consumers, male moderate consumers (≤3 cups/day) showed a lower risk for low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) (≤1 cup/day, hazard ratio (HR): 0.445, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.254-0.780; 1-3 cups/day, HR: 0.507, 95% CI: 0.299-0.859) and high fasting blood glucose (FPG) (≤1 cup/day, HR: 0.694, 95% CI: 0.538-0.895; 1-3 cups/day, HR: 0.763, 95% CI: 0.598-0.972). Male 3-in-1 coffee (coffee with sugar and creamer) consumers also showed a lower risk for low HDL-C (HR: 0.423, 95% CI: 0.218-0.824) and high FPG (HR: 0.659, 95% CI: 0.497-0.874). These findings indicate a negative association between moderate coffee consumption and low HDL-C and high FPG among Korean male adults.

Sugar industry sponsorship of germ-free rodent studies linking sucrose to hyperlipidemia and cancer: An historical analysis of internal documents.

In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF) secretly funded a review in the New England Journal of Medicine that discounted evidence linking sucrose consumption to blood lipid levels and hence coronary heart disease (CHD). SRF subsequently funded animal research to evaluate sucrose's CHD risks. The objective of this study was to examine the planning, funding, and internal evaluation of an SRF-funded research project titled "Project 259: Dietary Carbohydrate and Blood Lipids in Germ-Free Rats," led by Dr. W.F.R. Pover at the University of Birmingham, Birmingham, United Kingdom, between 1967 and 1971. A narrative case study method was used to assess SRF Project 259 from 1967 to 1971 based on sugar industry internal documents. Project 259 found a statistically significant decrease in serum triglycerides in germ-free rats fed a high sugar diet compared to conventional rats fed a basic PRM diet (a pelleted diet containing cereal meals, soybean meals, whitefish meal, and dried yeast, fortified with a balanced vitamin supplement and trace element mixture). The results suggested to SRF that gut microbiota have a causal role in carbohydrate-induced hypertriglyceridemia. A study comparing conventional rats fed a high-sugar diet to those fed a high-starch diet suggested that sucrose consumption might be associated with elevated levels of beta-glucuronidase, an enzyme previously associated with bladder cancer in humans. SRF terminated Project 259 without publishing the results. The sugar industry did not disclose evidence of harm from animal studies that would have (1) strengthened the case that the CHD risk of sucrose is greater than starch and (2) caused sucrose to be scrutinized as a potential carcinogen. The influence of the gut microbiota in the differential effects of sucrose and starch on blood lipids, as well as the influence of carbohydrate quality on beta-glucuronidase and cancer activity, deserve further scrutiny.