Tea vs Coffee: Very Different Results For Bones!

Tea and coffee both have abundant health benefits, and both have some small health risks (usually associated specifically with the caffeine, so drinking decaffeinated versions can avoid those in any case).

But when it comes to bone health, there’s a clear (albeit marginal, but clear) winner:

Here’s the tea

In few words: a decade-long prospective analysis examined whether coffee and tea intake were linked to changes in bone mineral density in older women.

More specifically: The Study of Osteoporotic Fractures followed (in the observational longitudinal study sense, not in the stalker sense) 9,704 women aged 65 and older for about 10 years, taking note of repeated self-reports of coffee and tea intake and repeated hip and femoral neck bone mineral density measurements using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry.

How tea and coffee scored:

• Tea: regular tea consumption was associated with slightly higher total hip bone mineral density, a small but statistically significant difference that could matter at a population level.
• Coffee: moderate coffee intake of about two to three cups per day was not linked to harm, while heavy intake of more than five cups per day was associated with lower bone mineral density.

In other words:

• Tea appears to be good for the bones
• Coffee is fine* at moderate levels, potentially harmful at more than 5 cups per day

*Actually likely better than “fine” at moderate levels, as we wrote about here: Coffee vs Frailty ← but that was about frailty in general, not bone density specifically

One category of drink that the study reinforced should be avoided, however was alcohol: higher alcohol intake strengthened the negative association between heavy coffee consumption and bone density.

On the flipside, and to share some good news: higher BMI strengthened the positive association between tea consumption and bone density.

Likely one of the differences between coffee and tea here is that while both are abundant in polyphenols, tea is generally higher in catechins, which can be particularly beneficial to bone formation.

Nevertheless these differences are modest, so:

❝Our results don’t mean you need to give up coffee or start drinking tea by the gallon❞

~ Dr. Enwu Liu

Read in full: Longitudinal Association of Coffee and Tea Consumption with Bone Mineral Density in Older Women: A 10-Year Repeated-Measures Analysis in the Study of Osteoporotic Fractures

Want to learn more?

First, about caffeine (unrelated to whether you get it from tea, coffee, or something else), you might like to check out: Caffeine: Cognitive Enhancer Or Brain-Wrecker?

Next, when choosing your tea, should you choose black, white, green, or red?

You can see which is best for what, here: Which Tea Is Best For The Health, By Science?

You can also learn about why getting flavonoids (as are abundant in these drinks) from diverse sources is important, here: Are You Getting The Right Kinds Of Flavonoids?

For more on polyphenols in general, see: 21 Most Beneficial Polyphenols & What Foods Have Them

For the coffee-lovers, enjoy: The Bitter Truth About Coffee (or is it?) ← as while we’ve focused on tea’s merits today, it’s worth noting before we close that coffee has a lot of health benefits; we didn’t cover them today because they were beside the point, but they are interesting nevertheless. including:

• 53% reduced suicide risk for coffee-drinkers
• Coffee is the world’s biggest source of antioxidants
• 65% reduced risk of Alzheimer’s for coffee-drinkers
• 67% reduced risk of type 2 diabetes for coffee-drinkers
• 43% reduced risk of liver cancer for coffee-drinkers

And if you don’t love coffee but would like the benefits, then check out: Green Coffee Bean Extract: Coffee Benefits Without The Coffee?

Enjoy!