Doctor tells Jamie Laing podcast why you 'need' to be drinking coffee as it has 'wild' health benefits
Coffee is one of life's simple pleasures. From holding a hot Americano in your hand on a winter's morning to sharing a latte or a flat white with a friend over a catch up, the beverage is one that is loved across the country.
The UK consumes about 98 million cups of coffee every day, according to puregusto, while a survey found that about a third of Scots visit a coffee shop at least once a week. But, is coffee actually good for us?
The answer is a resounding 'yes,' according to Professor Tim Spector, a UK epidemiologist, medical doctor, and science writer. Speaking recently on Made in Chelsea star Jamie Laing's 'Great Company' podcast, Mr Spector shared some pretty unbelievable insight about a hot cup of joe - and if anything, how we should be drinking more of it.
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"Coffee is a health drink," Spector told Jamie. "It reduces your risk of heart disease by about 30 per cent... heart disease is one of biggest killers.
"There's a microbe in all of us called Lawsonibacter that only drinks coffee. If you drink coffee, you've got masses of it. It's growing, it's there, you're nourishing it every day, and it gets all the fibre from coffee and breaks it down.
"If you're not a coffee drinker, you still have small levels of this microbe sitting there that have been transferred perhaps from kissing a coffee drinker."
Painting a pretty vivid analogy for what the microbe does inside of us, Spector went on: "It just sits there in this shrivelled form in your gut waiting for that first cup of coffee when it can bloom and have wild sex and carry on".
An incredulous Jamie goes on to say how he doesn't take caffeine because it "sends him loopy" - but is he missing out?
"Your Lawsonibacter is very upset," Professor Spector joked. "Why can't you just have the occasional cup of coffee? He'd be very happy if you give it decaf occasionally."
More seriously, he added: "Lawsonibacter is just the one that does coffee that we know about. But there are thousands others waiting for you to have these interesting foods for it to go crazy."
The Record previously reported on how a study led by experts from Tulane University in the US suggests that sipping coffee in the morning may offer greater health benefits than consuming it throughout the day.
Findings revealed that morning coffee drinkers had a 16 per cent lower risk of death compared to non-coffee drinkers. And, in line with Mr Spector's insight, they had a 31 per cent lower risk of dying from heart disease.
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