Archive for Tea & Health
Tea and Health
A wealth of evidence suggests that drinking tea is beneficial to health:
- Protection against cardiovascular disease;
- Prevention of heart disease and stroke;
- Protection against many types of cancer e.g. skin tumors, lung cancer, and digestive cancer;
- Inhibitory effects on DNA synthesis of leukemia cells and lung carcinoma cells;
- Lowering of bad cholesterol;
- Improvements in blood vessel function;
- Anti-inflammatory effects;
- Antibacterial effects;
- Rheumatoid arthritis prevention and relief;
- Inhibitory effects on dental caries.
Tea plants are among the plants with the highest total flavonoid content. 93% of total tea phenolic compounds are flavonoids. Green tea contains more simple flavonoids (called catechins), while black tea contains more complex varieties (called theflavins and thearubigins). The longer tea is left to brew, the higher the concentration of flavonoids.
For many years, it has been known that tea plant polyphenols are antioxidant. In fact, many common flavonoids are several times more potent than Vitamin C or E 12, 13. Growing interest in the antioxidant activity of phenolic compounds has led to increased research into potential health benefits.
(Source: Tea Board Kolkata)
Does Green Tea help cure amyloidosis?
In the September issue of Blood: Journal of the American Society of Hematology a scientific letter appeared about the possible effectiveness of green tea in curing amyloidosis, a medical condition in which amyloid proteins are abnormally deposited in organs and tissues of the body. The author Werner Hunstein, a renowned professor emeritus of hematology, who suffers from amyloidosis himself, traces the effects of green tea in improving his own illness. Hunstein was diagnosed with amyloidosis in 2001, and the aggressive chemotherapy treatment that followed left him shattered. That he managed to recover his strength and go back to normal in his daily life, Hunstein attributes to green tea. When he began to drink large amounts of green tea (usually about two liters per day), his condition improved significantly; the deposition of amyloid proteins was stopped, and his heart resumed beating more strongly.
In a letter to Teekampagne, our parent company, Professor Hunstein revealed that the green tea which proved so beneficial to his health was Teekampagne’s Darjeeling Green Tea.
(Werner Hunstein, “Epigallocathechin-3-gallate in AL amyloidosis: a new therapeutic option?” Blood, 15 September 2007, Vol. 110, No. 6, pp. 2216; “Hilft gruener Tee gegen krankhafte Eiweissablagerungen?” Neue Zuercher Zeitung, 19 September 2007.)
Tea Without Milk
In its April 2007 issue, page 20, the German magazine Fit for Fun reports that tea with milk is less healthy than ‘pure’ tea. Reflecting on a recent study of the Charite in Berlin, Fit for Fun writes,
“Wird Milch zum Tee hinzugefuegt, bleiben typische Effekte aus, etwa die Erweiterung der Arterien und ein Verbesserung des Blutflusses. Dies ergab eine Studie, in der 16 Frauen schwarzen Tee mit oder ohne Milch tranken. Die Ursache dafuer sind nach Angaben der Forscher die Proteine der Milch, die das im Tee enthaltene Katechin hemmen. Katechin hat eine schuetzende Wirkung auf die Gefaesse. Die Forscher vermuten ausserdem, dass Milch die erwiesene Antikrebswirkung von Tee beeintraechtigen kann.”
Black Tea for Stress Relief
A recent study, conducted by University College London and Unilever, found out that black tea can be a remedy for stress. People who drink four cups of black tea daily are less affected by stress-induced health problems.
People connect drinking tea to calming down, and those who drink tea tend to cope better with stress, Andrew Steptoe says. His study gives proof to the fact that tea induces positive changes in bodily chemistry. The level of the stress hormone Cortisol sank much more rapidly in those test persons who drank tea than in those who were given a placebo beverage to drink.
However, the exact substance responsible for this positive effect has not been identified yet. Tea consists of many different substances (polyphenols, flavonoids, etc.) — all of which have been tested as beneficial to health in previous studies.
(Source: Article in the German magazine Stern)