While perusing the headlines this morning, I came across this: “Six Cups of Decaf May Fend Off Diabetes”. My immediate reaction, of course, was: “…but then you’d actually have to drink 6 cups of wretched decaf…”.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love coffee. According to LY, we even missed a flight because I stopped to buy a cappuccino and I was shuffling through the airport slurping it as she frantically tried to find me while standing at the check-in desk watching the stern AA clerks synchronising their watches, so that just as I arrived at the desk (with cappuccino in hand) they could inform us that we’d missed the cutoff by ONE minute. I kid you not. However, we ended up with an extra 4 days in Toronto, so, in hindsight, that was one of the most enjoyable coffees I’ve ever had.

Anyway, I digress….I DO love coffee, but not much would compel me to drink SIX cups of decaf a day in order to stave off diabetes – I’m sure going for a walk is more of a guarantee. What’s even better is, if you actually read the article, you won’t walk away feeling terribly convinced. The line that stuck out most to me was: “Postmenopausal women who reported drinking more than six cups of java daily — presumably without extra cream or laden with sugar — had a 22% lower risk for type 2 diabetes” (emphasis mine). “Presumably” no cream or sugar?? You’d think that in a study that is trying to determine the role of phytochemicals in fighting disease the researchers would have established that basic fact. Aside from that, the study was based on self-reporting of nutritional information, so you have to assume inaccuracies and intentional mis-reporting.

I am sure next week a contradictory study will be relased, so I am not really that interested in the study itself. I still can’t get over the fact that someone would actually drink 6 cups of decaf a day…