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Caffeine Linked To Lower Skin Cancer Risk

THE_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER writes "The curative effects of coffee continue to be discovered as the Harvard School of Public Health and Boston's Brigham & Women's Hospital published a new study today that links caffeine consumption with reduced skin cancer rates. Quoting: 'The study of nearly 113,000 men and women found those who drank three or more cups of coffee a day had a 20 percent lower risk of basal cell carcinoma than those who said no to Joe. Caffeine in non-coffee substances was found equally effective. The cause is speculated to be related to caffeine's ability to "kill off damaged skin cells," said Dr. Josh Zeichner, assistant professor of dermatology at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. "If you get rid of these cells that are damaged, then they don't have the opportunity to grow and form cancers."'"

34 of 130 comments (clear)

  1. coffee by Phusion · · Score: 5, Funny

    Oh, good, I was just about to turn down my caffeine IV drip. I suppose it's time to turn it up!

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    640k ought to be enough for anyone.
    1. Re:coffee by Wain13001 · · Score: 2

      I've yet to meet a construction worker or a landscaper who didn't live off of coffee

  2. Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by Barbarian · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Perhaps those drinking 3 cups a day are more likely to be in jobs where they are virtually chained to a desk, so they rarely see the sun and thus less skin cancer.

    1. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by lvxferre · · Score: 5, Funny

      One more benefit of caffeine: it drives you away from hazards like fresh air and sun!

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    2. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by multiben · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There is no direct link to the study, but you are 100% right. Ensuring that correlations were made between study participants who were consistent in aspects such as age and lifestyle would be critical to this study having any meaning.

    3. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by ackthpt · · Score: 3, Informative

      One more benefit of caffeine: it drives you away from hazards like fresh air and sun!

      Sugar and caffeine will get you through anything.

      --

      A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
    4. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by clarkkent09 · · Score: 4, Funny

      In other news, those drinking more than 3 Piña Coladas a day were 20% more likely to get skin cancer. But it's worth it!

      --
      Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
    5. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by dwarfsoft · · Score: 4, Funny

      Except Diabetes. And Sleep. Unless by through you mean through it awake.

      --
      Cheers, Chris
    6. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by TheInternetGuy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Perhaps those drinking 3 cups a day are more likely to be in jobs where they are virtually chained to a desk, so they rarely see the sun and thus less skin cancer.

      Normally I would agree with your line of thinking. But since coffee also has been show to cut the rates of liver cancer and Alzheimer. I would say that there are other functions at work here. All three seems to be, as the summary stated, related to the ability to kill off damaged cells before they do more damage.

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    7. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by proslack · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The military runs on coffee. I used to wash raw coffee grounds down with a swig from my canteen on road marches (no hot water) when I was an infantryman. Plenty of people with non-desk jobs drink coffee, especially in colder climates. That's what Thermos bottles are for.

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      Floating in the black seas of infinity without a paddle.
    8. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by plover · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I think you're on to something.

      Colder climates are cold because they receive less energy from the sun. Not that you can't get harmful doses of UV in the colder climates, it just takes longer. Colder climates also require more covering of arms, legs, and the head - thus further reducing the overall exposure to the UV rays from the sun.

      Some people drink less coffee when it's warm out, and more coffee in the winter. And some people drink coffee only when it's dark in the mornings - again, the sign of living at higher latitudes.

      Perhaps this study is simply revealing a correlation between people who drink coffee and living closer to the poles?

      --
      John
    9. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by ColdWetDog · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is the generic problem with observational studies. They often turn out to be flat out wrong when you finally end up doing a more controlled, blinded study. Going on people's recollection of what they did or did not consume is fraught with inaccuracy.

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    10. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by retchdog · · Score: 2

      the study included self-report sun exposure; the higher quintiles of caffeine consumption had very slightly higher sun exposure (but not significant).

      something that struck me though, was that very high caffeine consumption (>600mg/day) was linked with heavy smoking (addicts are addicts across the board). i personally suspect that naively "compensating" for heavy smoking (by doing a non-causal regression) bled over into reduced cancer for the same group, as a statistical artifact. this is consistent with their finding that decaf doesn't have an effect; if you're worried about caffeine, you're probably not smoking much either.

      you can't just throw inter-correlated variables into a regression formula and say you've "controlled" for them. well, you can, but you shouldn't. there are better ways.

      --
      "They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
    11. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by canajin56 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Due to things like ice coffee and iced frappachinos there's not really any dip in coffee sales during hot weather. At least, the lines aren't any shorter at Timmy's ;)

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    12. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by PopeRatzo · · Score: 2

      Perhaps those drinking 3 cups a day are more likely to be in jobs where they are virtually chained to a desk, so they rarely see the sun and thus less skin cancer.

      Why are people who drink 3 cups of coffee a day more likely to have jobs where they are stuck indoors?

      If you've ever been around a construction crew or on a farm, you'd know that they drink a whole lot of coffee.

      Also, policemen, firemen and bike messengers.

      First, remember that a "cup of coffee" is not necessarily the 32 oz super soy vente skinny caramel w/extra foam. A cup of coffee is approximately 7-8 oz of strong, fragrant bliss. If your coffee is cold enough for you to swig the last half of the styrofoam container, you're drawing too much at a time.

      I taught in Italy for a year and spent a lot of time there and across the way in what used to be called Yugoslavia. They drink wonderful coffee over there. I was working on something and spent a lot of time in a cafe (my office was cramped and unpleasant). They had these cups that most Americans who are used to giant mugs that have some clever saying on the side would think are unimaginably tiny. Not espresso cups, mind, or demi-tasse, but a nice small china coffee cup, like you'd get in a fancy restaurant. These were beautiful china with a red glaze on the outside and refrigerator white on the inside. The coffee just looks great in those cups. I offered to buy a set of those cups when I was getting ready to come back to the states, and the owner, this sweetheart Coleggio, wrapped up four of the cups with little saucers and gave them to me (I had spent enough money there to put one of his kids through college). That's 25 years ago now, and I still drink my coffee out of those cups. My daughter broke one of them when she was about 5, but the other three are holding up quite well. Three cups: one first thing in the morning while I'm getting ready to do my taijiquan on the deck, one more while I'm shaving and one more maybe after breakfast while I play an hour of whatever game has my attention (today it was Spec Ops: the Line which is not as bad as I thought it was going to be). Then I leave for my day's activities. For a while, I thought maybe I shouldn't drink the coffee before I do martial arts, but my teacher, Hsu Fun Yuen, who is now 87, drinks this strong-ass dragons' well green tea all day and has been doing so since he was a kid back in China, so I figure it's OK. If that stuff doesn't hurt him, I figure, my little cups of coffee aren't going to mess with me. If I drink that tea, you have to scrape me off the ceiling.

      Now, if I drink any more than that I don't sleep well. Three cups- that's it. And guess what? I don't have any skin cancer. Anecdotally, that's conclusive enough for me.

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      You are welcome on my lawn.
    13. Re:Lots of coffee or caffeine = always indoors? by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 2

      They did in fact control for a number of risk factors: "BMI, physical activity, smoking status, childhood reaction to sun, severe sunburns, moles, hair color, family history of melanoma, sun exposures at different age intervals, UV index, and history of nonskin cancer." If you have access through a university library or other source, here's the link to the actual article.

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      The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
  3. I-i-i-i- by ackthpt · · Score: 3, Funny

    w-w-wwwonderedw-w-whyI-i-d-d-don't-t-tb-b-b-urna-a-a-sm-m-uch-a-a-a-sI-i-i-u-u-usedt-t-t-o

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    A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
  4. "kill off damaged skin cells," by John+Hasler · · Score: 3, Funny

    So maybe you should bathe in it rather than drink it?

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    Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
    1. Re:"kill off damaged skin cells," by RedBear · · Score: 2

      So maybe you should bathe in it rather than drink it?

      You say that to be funny, but... http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/accessories/5a65/

  5. Re:Thank you WELL_HUNG_OYSTER by Surt · · Score: 3, Funny

    THE_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER, please. It's not like he's just ANY_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER. He's the one.

    --
    "Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
  6. Re:Hot off the press by kanto · · Score: 2

    A study published today linked the acceptance of funding from coffee cartels to the finding of health benefits of coffee consumption.

    (More) News at ten.

    This! You rarely get similar exciting news about tea either killing you or giving you eternal life, makes me think I've chosen some kind of third world beverage... even alcohol gets the occasional "it's okay if you don't overdo it" so it has to have some first world banking behind it.

  7. Re:Contradiction? by steelfood · · Score: 2

    everybody is telling me that caffeine gives me cancer

    Only the State of California knows that.

    --
    "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
  8. Re:Hot off the press by ColdWetDog · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't think you have to target the Illuminati. Some people have been trying to shoot down caffeine forever. It's a drug, so it has to be bad. It makes people feel good, so it has to be bad.

    Unfortunately for the Puritans, it turns out the coffee is pretty innocuous. But, like with another popular drug that's made out to be more dangerous than it is, a portion of the society will never accept the phrase 'better living through chemistry'.

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    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  9. Re:if only I could... by Farmer+Tim · · Score: 4, Funny

    No, you're supposed to take it orally.

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    Blank until /. makes another boneheaded UI decision.
  10. Re:Hot off the press by russotto · · Score: 2

    Unless you've been living under a rock, you get stories about the health benefit of tea all the time. Alcohol, too, though usually with caveats not backed up by the data. Nutritionists and public health people are generally ascetics, though, so stories about something that people like to consume being good for you are often downplayed or ignored.

  11. Hold the phone by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Funny

    Caffeine in non-coffee substances was found equally effective.

    Wait just a minute - let's not go injecting unproven pseudo-science into this discussion!

    Coffee is a source of good caffeine. Some of those other substances contain bad caffeine.

    -- Your friends on the Coffee Council

    --
    #DeleteChrome
  12. An associative hypothesis with a weak result by dbet · · Score: 4, Informative

    Be careful of studies that link things with minor changes from the control group, even ones with large populations. 20% lower than an already low risk is pretty much nothing. Just as an example, smokers have a 2000% higher risk of lung cancer than non-smokers. Whites have a 400% higher chance of melanoma than blacks.

    The only time you can take small changes seriously is when there are multiple sources and a proposed mechanism that is consistent with our previous understanding. "May help kill damaged cells" might be 100% correct, but it's not a mechanism, it's just the hypothesized result.

    These kinds of studies are interesting but don't make too much out of them.

  13. Did they consider... by nighthawk243 · · Score: 2

    DId they consider the fact that most of us who consume tons of caffeine are usually stuffed in an office somewhere outside of sunlight all day? The only sunlight I ever get is during the commute to and from work.

  14. Basal Cell Carcinoma? Big deal... by tpjunkie · · Score: 3, Informative

    Basal cell carcinomas are very slow growing, very, very rarely invasive, and almost hardly metastasize. They're gross, unsightly and unpleasant, but not really a killer. If this were melanoma on the other hand, that'd be a big deal.

  15. Re:Contradiction? by jd2112 · · Score: 2

    The state of California causes cancer.

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    Any insufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.
  16. Re:Causation =/= Correlation by Jarik+C-Bol · · Score: 3, Insightful

    anecdotal evidence is anecdotal! Most of the people I know work outside, all day long, physical labor. They drink coffee all morning, and iced tea all afternoon. Your Caffeine user = indoor worker model is anecdotal at best, and assumptive at worst.

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    I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
  17. Studies showing what I'm already doing is healthy by UpnAtom · · Score: 2

    On the other hand, the placebo effect of believing in the health benefits of moderate coffee consumption are likely to far exceed the actual ones.

  18. Re:Hot off the press by DaBigEnchilada · · Score: 2

    I seem to recall that from about 2006 to 2008 all I heard about was the health benefits of tea, especially green tea. (Remember 'superfoods' and how 'antioxidants' were/are the solution to all health woes?) A quick google search for 'health benefits green tea' yields just shy of 6 million results. Is it just that none of these articles appeared on slashdot that's causing your conspira-spidey sense to tingle?

  19. Do Your Nuts Hang Inside or Outside Your Shell? by littlewink · · Score: 2

    With a name like "THE_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER" I just gotta ask.