14 DAY TRIAL // Contrary to popular opinion, caffeine consumption can, under certain circumstances, yield noteworthy health benefits, a new study suggests.
Experiments carried out on mice have shown that caffeine jump-starts and stimulates the metabolization of lipids stored inside one such rodent's liver.
Thus, mice made to regularly consume caffeine had less lipids stored in their livers, despite the fact that they were being fed a high-fat diet.
“This is the first detailed study of the mechanism for caffeine action on lipids in liver and the results are very interesting,” specialist Paul Yen explains.
“Coffee and tea are so commonly consumed and the notion that they may be therapeutic, especially since they have a reputation for being 'bad' for health, is especially enlightening,” he further details on his and his colleagues’ findings.
Researchers suspect that the outcome of these experiments also holds true for humans, and that people suffering from non-alcoholic fatty liver disease could experience an improvement in their condition should they include some caffeine in their diet.
It appears that, all things considered, some 4 cups of coffee or tea per day would be more than enough to help an individual's liver get back in shape, EurekAlert reports.
Presently, 30% of the people living in the US suffer from non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. Most of these people are either diabetic or obese, and this makes them more vulnerable to the aforementioned medical condition, the same source informs us.
The scientists who worked on this study hope that, should further investigations prove that caffeine does indeed constitute a treatment option for said medical condition, drugs that mimic its effects would soon be developed.
These drugs would help reduce fatty liver, but would not trigger any of the side effects presently linked to a high caffeine intake.
A detailed account of this investigation and its findings is to be made available to the public in the scientific journal Hepatology this coming September.