Health
Benefits of Green Tea
This
describes the many health benefits of green tea and white tea, and to a
lessor extent, black tea.
White tea is slightly higher in anti-oxidants than the green tea. The
white tea is made out of tea buds and the green tea out of the tea
leaves. White tea is the least fermented and black tea is the most
fermented. There is a book by Steven
Pratt, M.D. that tells about the 14
healthiest foods called SuperFoods
Rx. One of them is tea. It says "Tea
contains more than four thousand chemical compounds."
An
ancient
Chinese proverb says "Better
to be deprived of food for three days, than tea for one." This
webpage explains why it is better to drink tea than water. I have a
webpage about drinking pure water. It explains how the water in America
has many pollutants in it including many medications. The webpage
explains that the only way to take out all these harmful pollutants is
to use a water distiller or a water purifier instead of a filter.
You
can filter a gallon of water in less than a minute, but it will leave
in countless harmful pollutants that dissolve in water. To take out all
the pollutants and make the water pure, you can purify a gallon of
water in about an hour or distill a gallon of water in about 6 hours.
That way you take out all of the pollutants. But then some experts have
made this controversial since it takes out all of the mineral also.
Now
I would say, like many other
experts, that you are supposed to get your minerals from food, not from
water. But then I also need to explain how the minerals in foods are
organic, not as in organically grown, but as in organic chemistry.
Organic means something that is or was alive. Whereas the minerals in
water could be from urine, from dirt or from chemical pollutants.
So
instead of going into all of that and then the arguments of how pure
water with no minerals is bad for you, I suggest that people take this
water with no pollutants in it and make tea. Then it will have organic
minerals in it from a food (tea leaves). In China no one drinks water.
They drink tea. The tea they drink is from the tea shrub called camellia
sinensis. To avoid confusion they call other teas, herbal
teas. About 5,000 years ago the Chinese discovered that the tea plant
had many health benefits.
Herbs
and herbology was very big in China. So the elite people in China would
drink tea and enjoy the many health benefits of white tea, green tea
and black tea. Black tea is fermented more so it does not have as many
benefits as the green and white tea. Eventually all the Chinese wanted
to get the health benefits of tea so they grew tons of it so everyone
can drink it. In America when you go eat at a Chinese restaurant, they
give you tea to drink for free.
They know that
caffeine raises blood pressure. Since tea has caffeine in it then it
should raise blood pressure. But many studies show that tea lowers
blood pressure. Tea has a unique amino acid in it that is not in other
foods called theanine.
Here is a link to PubMed.gov--
U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Intitutes of Health. This website says that l-Theanine,
an amino acid in green tea reduces Alzheimer
disease (AD). It concludes the study by saying "Thus,
l-theanine may be useful in the prevention and treatment of AD."
Digested polyphenol compounds
from green tea can protect the brain against developing Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia,
according to the latest research that has been done. An in vitro study,
published in Phytomedicine,
confirmed that after digestion, extracts of the phytochemical-rich
drink show protective effects for dementia. It found that green tea
worked better for this after it was digested than before it was
digested. The most common form of dementiia, Alzheimer's disease, is a
progressive and irreversible neurodegenerative disorder associated with
cognitive dysfunction.
Theanine
(l-theanine) is an amino acid found in ordinary tea leaves from Camellia
sinensis (also known as Thea sinensis,
hence the name theanine, pronounced like tea-anene). It is also found
in other species of Camellia and in the edible bay
boletes mushroom Xerocomus badius, but is otherwise
rare in nature. L-theanine has the reputation for promoting mental and
physical relaxation-decreasing stress and anxiety-without inducing
drowsiness. In tea, it has an influence on the taste (reducing
bitterness) and is said to counteract some of the nervous agitation
that can come with caffeine.
Preliminary
research, that needs to be carried further before more specific claims
for benefits can be properly made, suggests that l-theanine may be
helpful for the following applications:
- improving learning
performance, heightening mental
acuity, and promoting concentration;
- acting
antagonistically against high doses of
caffeine;
- calming nervous
agitation;
- lowering blood
pressure;
- diminishing
symptoms of PMS
An
article in New Scientist
magazine mentions that numerous studies suggest that green tea protects
against a range of cancers, including lung, prostate and breast cancer.
The reason cited is the antioxidant and phytochemmical epigallocatechin
gallate (EGCG), according to Hirofumi Tachibana's team at Kyushu
University. Plant foods contain thousands of phytochemicals that
provide health benefits. Webmd.com
says:
One
of them, a study conducted in Japan that involved nearly 500 Japanese
women with Stage I and Stage II breast cancer, found that increased
green tea consumption before and after surgery was associated with
lower recurrence of the cancers.
Studies
in China have shown that the more green tea that participants drank,
the less the risk of developing stomach cancer, esophageal cancer,
prostate cancer, pancreatic cancer, and colorectal cancer.
Finally,
a recent analysis of 22 studies that probed the correlation between
high tea consumption and reduced risk for lung cancer concluded that by
increasing your daily intake of green (not black) tea by two cups may
reduce the risk of developing lung cancer by 18%.
A
Dutch study of more than 3,000 men and women found that the more tea
consumed, the less severe the clogging of the heart's blood vessels,
especially in women.
But
green tea's antioxidants are dilators, she says, because they improve
the flexibility of blood vessels and make them less vulnerable to
clogging -- and antioxidant-rich blueberries and pomegranates do the
same. [See my webpage about the best
group of foods for cardiovascular health.]
In
the Japanese study, 240 men and women were given varying amounts of
green tea extract for three months. Those who got the highest amount
lost fat and weight and had lower blood pressure and lower LDL "bad"
cholesterol.
Clinical trials conducted by
the University of
Geneva and the University of Birmingham show that green tea raises
metabolic rates, speeds up fat oxidation and improves insulin
sensitivity and glucose tolerance. In addition to caffeine and EGCG,
green tea contains catechin polyphenols that raise thermogenesis (the
production of heat by the body) and increases energy expenditure.
The Harvard Universtiy website
(harvard.edu) says:
Green
tea is the best food source of a group called catechins. In test tubes,
catechins are more powerful than vitamins C and E in halting oxidative
damage to cells and appear to have other disease-fighting properties.
Studies have found an association between consuming green tea and a
reduced risk for several cancers, including, skin, breast, lung, colon,
esophageal, and bladder.
Research
published in April 2009 by the University of L'Aquila and funded by the
Unilever-owned Lipton Institute of Tea suggests that drinking just one
cup of regular, black tea per day may help to protect against
cardiovascular disease.
Research
presented at the International Stroke Conference in February 2009 found
that drinking three or more cups of tea per day can reduce the risk of
suffering a stroke by as much as 21%. This research, conducted at the
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), found that drinking green
and black varieties of teas has a significant impact on the risk of
stroke.
On 21
April 2003 the Brigham and Women's Hospital released details of a
research project which indicated that theanine may help the body's
immune system response when fighting infection, by boosting the
disease-fighting capacity of gamma delta T cells.
Green
tea can even help prevent tooth decay! Just as its bacteria-destroying
abilities can help prevent food poisoning, it can also kill the
bacteria that causes dental plaque. It also contains organic fluoride
that is different than the inorganic flouride put it water.
Catechin
is a strong antioxidant that slows the aging process. It is the bitter
ingredient of green tea that effectively kills bacteria which causes
food poisoning and also kills the toxins produced by those bacteria.
Catechin suppresses the formation of plaque by cariogenic bacteria and
also kills the bacteria themselves. It also kills other bacteria that
cause bad breath.
Green
tea contains natural fluorine which helps prevent cavities. The Mayo
Clinic (mayoclinic.org) says "The [tea] leaves are loaded with
flavonoids and other polyphenols that work as antioxidants, possibly
lowering the risk of some diseases."
In the 1930s Swedish
chemist and nutritionist, Ragnar
Berg
created a chart (Here is the Chart) showing how healthy different foods were. His
discoveries in nutrition are still in medical textbooks today. This
chart was in Arnold
Ehret's book on fasting and healthy eating. It was based
on how akaline or acid forming the foods
were. Ragnar Berg tested the mineral ash of the foods which he got by burning them to duplicate digestion. This is why an acid fruit like pineapple is an alkaline food.
The more alkaline, the healthier. The more acid forming foods were the
ones that accelerated the degeneratiive diseases like cancer and
cardiovascular problems. Green tea was the most alkaline food on his
list (53.5)!
Decaffeination
destroys some of the beneficial compounds in tea so more
is needed to get the same health benefits. But you can drink tea all
day instead of other beveages. It can be unsweetened or have healthy
sweeteners like agave, honey or stevia.
University of
Maryland Medical Center website (umm.edu) says:
In fact, researchers
estimate that the rate of heart attack decreases by 11% with
consumption of 3 cups of tea per day.
The main polyphenol
in green tea is epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG). Scientific studies
suggest that EGCG and green tea polyphenols have anti-inflammatory and
anticancer properties that may help prevent the onset and growth of
skin tumors (skin cancer).
Green tea may also be
useful in inflammatory diseases, such as arthritis.
Research indicates
that green tea may benefit arthritis by reducing inflammation and
slowing cartilage breakdown. Chemicals found in green tea may also be
effective in treating genital warts and preventing symptoms of colds
and influenza. Studies also show that drinking green tea is associated
with reduced risk of all cause mortality.
The theanine in green
tea is a natural relaxant that diminshes stress. [J Herb Pharmacother.
2006;6(2):21-30.] Studies show that it enhances the brain's ability to
concentrate, learn and remember.
Unlike
caffeine, theanine increases GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid),
an inhibitory neurotransmitter that not only induces relaxation but it
also produces a sense of well-being. L-theanine may normalize levels of
dopamine, a critical brain hormone that is depleted by various stress
factors.
This may be good for
people who have used the drug, meth. Meth releases a surge of
dopamine, causing an intense rush of pleasure or prolonged sense of
euphoria. Over time, meth destroys dopamine receptors, making it
impossible to feel pleasure.
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Copyright 2010 by Chuck
Bluestein
