High coffee consumption does NOT lead to higher risk of early death.

The media generally has low ability or minimal willingness to judge information they receive, before deciding to pass it on to the public.  Really.  Today's reports over a study that associates high coffee consumption with higher risks of early death is one such case.

Or rather, as most in the media have reported, causation has been established between premature death and copious coffee consumption.

That's not quite what the study says, and frankly, the media missed out on a lot of things within the study, that should raise some eyebrows.

First, the study's own hazard ratio tables are all over the place.

Look very closely at the chart, and I will guide you to four of its most amusing parts.

1. According to their own models, women who drink 1-7 cups/wk, and 15-21 cups/wk actually have a lower risk of premature death, than those who didn't drink coffee, with and without regards to other factors.
2. And while men who drank 15-28 cups/wk had a slightly higher risk of death compared to those who didn't drink coffee, the risk association was significantly lower than those who drank 8-14 cups/wk.
3. Women who drank >28 cups/wk of coffee, had the lowest risk of cardiovascular disease, especially compared to those who didn't drink coffee!
4. Men who drank 1-28 cups/wk, taking into consideration smoking, BMI and other risk factors, showed no statistically significant risk of cardiovascular disease.

Now, here's where the CVD risk levels become critical to judging the value of this study: What the media has reported, is that if you drink a lot of coffee, you have a much higher risk of death, but that's all causes of death, meaning you could have been shot dead or fallen off a roller coaster and your death would count as associated with higher coffee consumption.

Therefore, in order for the all-causes death risk to be useful, you would want to see it mirrored in isolated causes of death, particularly in CVD, but not limited to CVD.  And in fact, there are several other studies showing that high coffee consumption is good for you.  Heck, this study itself shows that high coffee consumption is associated with lower CVD risk in women!

So for instance, this study posted just last month shows a significantly lower risk of suicide with higher coffee consumption, once smoking is factored out.

And this European study showed a modest risk reduction of prostate cancer incidence, with more coffee that was consumed, while this American study could not exclude the possibility of lower risk of incidence of prostate cancer due to high coffee consumption, but there was no statistically significant risk associated with prostate cancer and high coffee consumption.

Better yet, this Journal of Nutrition study shows that there is a strong inverse association between caffeine (coffee / tea) and mortality, " in a multiethnic urban population".

Bottom line:  If there's anything you should take away from this study, it is that high coffee consumption is associated with lower risk for cardiovascular disease in women, not that high coffee consumption leads to higher risk of early death.