Can Coffee Be Dangerous?

There is something curative about coffee in its natural, unsweetened state.

Coffee can help you lose weight. It can blunt chronic pain. Contrary to most people's expectations, it can lower your blood pressure. Just about every coffee drinker knows that coffee can help you focus your attention and find more energy to get through the day.

Coffee often gets a bad rap from natural health gurus, and that's entirely understandable when the topic is those addictive high-calorie combinations of coffee, cream, sugar, and candy you can get at Starbucks (which, to be fair, also sells coffee in its health versions).

Coffee often gets a bad rap, especially when health-oriented people take a long, hard look at the sweet and fatty concoctions you might get at your neighborhood branch of an international chain of coffee shops. But the fact is that coffee has been considered curative for many conditions for hundreds of years. One only needs to drink the right kind (or sometimes to take the right coffee extract) in the right way.

What can coffee do for you?

• Relieve allergies. There have been precise, laboratory measurements of decreased production of inflammatory markers in the lungs after consumption of the Middle Eastern coffee beverage qahwa (coffee flavored with ginger, saffron, and cardamom). The effects of drinking this beverage were roughly equivalent to using an antihistamine without the side effects.
• Relieve asthma. Drinking a cup of regular (but not decaf) coffee helps asthmatics exhale a greater volume of air for about four hours. There are similar affects for a variety of caffeinated beverages, but coffee is the best studied.
• Help you get over colds and flu. In a British clinical trial, both regular and decaffeinated coffee, drunk hot, relieved congestion, muscle pain, and fatigue in people who had colds. After care of colds and flu. A study in Iran found that coffee and honey, rather than tea and honey, was the most effective remedy for persistent cough after upper respiratory infections. In this study coffee turned out to be a better cough remedy even than steroid medications.

READ Is Decaffeinated Or Decaf Coffee Healthy?

• Peptic ulcers.There is some evidence that the chlorogenic acid in coffee protects against the development of peptic (stomach) ulcers.
• Prevent gout. Drinking coffee and other caffeinated beverages protects against developing gout, at least in women, a 26-year followup of 89,143 women in the Nurses Health Study found. Consumers of 2 or more cups a day were about 50 percent less likely to develop this painful, debilitating condition. Earlier, smaller studies have found a similar protective benefit for coffee against gout in men.
• Polycystic ovarian disease (PCOS). One study found that drinking decaffeinated coffee for 4 weeks lowers both total and free testosterone levels in women, slightly, which would be beneficial in PCOS. Regular coffee lowers total testosterone in women, but free testosterone levels are not affected in just 4 weeks. No similar effects were noted for coffee in men.

These findings don't mean it's always better for your health to drink coffee. For instance, drinking coffee can actually increases the risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis—if you happen to carry a copy of a gene called ACPA, and you drink more than 10 cups of regular coffee per day. But there is one kind of coffee that should not be consumed by anyone, ever.

Stiff Bull Coffee Products and Similar Male Enhancement Products Are Not Recommended

The fact that a product is labeled as "coffee" doesn't make it automatically good. That's particularly true of a supposed male enhancement (penis-enlarging, erection increasing) product called Stiff Bull. This coffee may in fact enable men to become "stiff." The problem isn't that it doesn't work. The problem with this product is that it works because it contains a chemical compound called desmethylcarbodenafil. 

What Is Desmethylcarbodenafil?

Desmethylcarbodenafil is a designer drug that was first analyzed by health regulator labs in 2010. The molecule that makes desmethylcarbodenafil is very similar to sildenafil, which is better known as Viagra. Like Viagra, this designer drug works by interfering with the action of an enzyme called cGMP-specific phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE5), which accelerates the degradation of cGMP, which regulates blood flow in the penis. The two drugs work by making sure that blood that flows into the penis doesn't flow out, ensuring a stiffer erection during sexual excitement. They don't actually make the organ larger, but they do increase the time it can stay erect.

What's the Problem with Stiffer Erections?

The obvious problem for men who use either of the two drugs mentioned above is that blood that is "locked" in the penis isn't available to flow elsewhere in the body. Especially in men who take nitrates for high blood pressure (medications like isosorbide mononitrate, which is generic, or brand name drugs like Imzo or Imdur) or nitroglycerin for chest pain, taking desmethylcarbodenafil or sildenafil (Viagra) can result in sudden low blood pressure. This can have a variety of effects. In some cases, the man will simply need to sit down or lie down. He may still have an erection, but he won't be able to do anything with it. In other cases, the effects are more severe, and the man loses consciousness or in extreme cases dies. The combination of either Stiff Bull or Viagra with blood pressure or angina medications at the very least will keep a man from enjoying sex, and in some cases may be fatal.

READ Natural Viagra Alternatives

Is Force Factor VolcaNO Supplement a Substitute for Stiff Bull?

Some websites are promoting a product called Force Factor VolcaNO as a substitute for the male enhancement product Stiff Bull. The VolcaNO supplement is designed for enhancing muscle enlargement, not penis enlargement, but it can have a safer effect on men's erections. VolcaNO Supplement contains four amino acids that are especially important in helping muscles rebuild fibers after workouts. The body can use one of these amino acids for making a substance called NO, which helps the arteries that lead into the penis expand so the penis can become erect.

VolcaNO doesn't, however, affect the substances that keep blood from leaving the penis, and it won't cause sudden, severe drops in blood pressure. Men who want to have better erections, however, are better off seeking treatments provided by a doctor, which can be calibrated to a man's needs and won't have potentially dangerous side effects when used as directed.