http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0010864/

Caffeine acts as a mild bronchodilator for people with asthma. Two hours after drinking coffee or tea, people with asthma show signs of easier breathing.

My asthma has mellowed out quite a bit since drinking coffee regularly. I still have to use a rescue inhaler, but they last me for years instead of months now.

I learned about the coffee-asthma connection courtesy of "Quantum Leap" in the early 90s.
:D

I don't drink coffee, but I do notice that I crave soda or tea when i am having problems breathing. I just Googled this and it confirmed my suspicions.

Caffeine is an anti-inflammatory, so it makes sense that it would aid breathing since asthma is caused by inflammation and muscle constriction in the lungs and bronchial tubes.

Caffeine has also been shown to be protective against Alzheimer's. Utah has the fastest growing rate of Alzheimer's in the nation.

And protective against type 2 diabetes.

So we're all born with a caffeine deficiency?

Funny how I keep reading all the benefits of alcohol, marijuana, and caffeine.

If caffeine protects against diabetes, suppose you can eat all the donuts you want as long as you have coffee with it.

Caffeine is not magic. It is similar chemically to an old asthma medication, theophylline, and to theobroma, the stuff in chocolate that is "as bad as caffeine", as some zealot told me many years ago. They differ by only a small substitution to the parent ring structure. So caffeine is indeed a bronchodilator. This has been known for decades. Theophylline works the best out of the three. Due to some side effects it has been discontinued form the market for humans, at least in the US, but for many years it was the first choice for asthma patients.