In the book Healthy Healing by Linda Rector-Paige, N.D., PhD, she says:
“...Some of the health problems of caffeine are...well known—headaches
and migraines, irritability, stomach and digestive problems, anxiety, and
high blood pressure. As an addictive stimulant, it works as a drug,
causing jumpiness and nerves, heart disease, heart palpitations. Caffeine
in excessive amounts, can produce oxalic acid in the system, causing a
host of problems waiting to become diseases. It can lodge in the liver,
restricting proper function, and constrict arterial blood flow.
It leaches out B vitamins from the body...It depletes some essential minerals,
including calcium and potassium...however the carcinogenic effects often
blamed on caffeine are now thought to be caused by the roasting process
used in making coffee, tea and chocolate.
Since decaffeinated coffee has been implicated in some forms of organ cancer,
conclusions are being drawn that caffeine is not the culprit—the roasted
hydro-carbons are...”
Unfiltered coffee raises serum cholesterol and liver enzymes. One study in the British Medical Journal shows that cafetiere (brewed, unfiltered) coffee raises serum LDL cholesterol levels and serum concentrations of alanine aminotransferase (ALT). Cafetiere coffee is made by pouring boiling water over ground coffee in a container with a sieve plunger. Dr. Rob Urgert and others at Wageningen Agricultural University in the Netherlands observed that unfiltered coffee raised alanine aminotransferase 80% above baseline levels relative to filtered coffee. Once the subjects stopped drinking cafetiere coffee, the liver enzyme and LDL cholesterol concentrations returned to baseline levels. The Dutch investigators write that “Daily consumption of five to six cups of strong cafetiere coffee affects the integrity of liver cells...” and they attribute the increases in cholesterol and alanine aminotransferase concentrations to the diterpenes cafestol and kahweol that are abundant in cafetiere. - BMJ 1996;313:00-00.
