Study: Coffee Drinkers Have High Heart Risk

People who drink large amounts of coffee are more than twice as likely to contract heart disease, according to a study released Monday.

Dr. Thomas A. Pearson of Baltimore's Johns Hopkins Medical School, who co-authored the study, told The New York Times this week that the researchers analyzed coffee-drinking habits and medical histories of 1130 white men who graduated from the school between 1948 and 1964. Fifty-one of the subjects have since died or had heart problems, and those who drank more than five cups of coffee daily sustained a risk of developing heart problems 2.8 times that of non-coffee drinkers.

Are Harvard students, long renowned for their preference of study to sleep, at risk? Dr. Warren E.C. Wacker, director of University Health Services, said they are not especially endangered as a group, and that long-term coffee use is far more dangerous than sporadic caffeine concentrations. Wacker said that the study was "dealing with fairly small numbers" and hence unworthy of alarm. He added that if coffee drinking does cause heart trouble, it is certainly not as dangerous to consumers as tobacco addiction.

Jon Shaffer, a supervisor at the Freshman Union, calculates that the about 1600 freshmen alone consume about 289 gallons of coffee each week, or 5285 7-ounce cupfuls.