Medical Update - February 2, 2005

A couple of breakfast beverages are proving to be helpful to your health. News on 6 anchor LeAnne Taylor has that and more in this Medical Update. <br/><br/>When you drink that morning cup of coffee,

Wednesday, February 2nd 2005, 10:29 am

By: News On 6

A couple of breakfast beverages are proving to be helpful to your health. News on 6 anchor LeAnne Taylor has that and more in this Medical Update.

When you drink that morning cup of coffee, you might be fighting cancer. Something in that morning cup of Joe may help guard against liver cancer. Japanese researchers found people who drink more than a cup of coffee a day are less likely to develop liver cancer than those who drink less or none at all.

The scientists have not yet pinpointed what substance in java seems to be helping the liver but say chlorogenic acid, which is in coffee beans, reduced the risk of live cancer in a separate animal study.

If tea is your beverage of choice, scientists have new evidence that green tea may help improve endurance. Researchers gave green tea supplements to mice and found they could swim longer and stronger than mice not taking the tea extract.

The author of the study says green tea made the mice burn more efficiently. No human studies have been done yet but the amount of green tea eaten by the mice would add up to about four cups a day for a human athlete.

And AIDS among infants in the US is close to being eliminated. Nationwide the number of HIV infected newborns dropped from about 2,000 in 1990 to just a little more than 200 IN 2003.

The drug AZT is a key reason for the dramatic drop. It reduces the amount of HIV in an infected mother's blood, cutting the chances she will pass it to her child. Better education and testing also contributed to the decline.