The Health Benefits From a Cup of Tea

A cup of tea takes about five minutes. However, these 5 minutes a day can provide you with great health benefits. There are many past researches and on-going studies on the effects of tea on cancer prevention, cardiovascular health, and prevention of tooth decay.

Although there was not any study that is 100% sure what are the benefits of tea, but all the researches concluded that different component in tea , especially the EGCG have positive effects on cancer cells and other organs such tooth, stomach, and skin. This is not pessimistic for tea because science is constantly changing. Different people do the experiment differently and reach different conclusions with different levels of confidence.

Nevertheless, there are some conclusions that most of researches on teas all reached which will be listed later. These similar and encouraging conclusions are enough to say that drinking tea is good for you. The extent of goodness depends on individual’s opinion.

There are three conclusions that are included in almost all of the books about tea and tea health. First, tea may have the ability to inhibit the oxidation of LDL (often known as the bad cholesterol). Since LDL is one of the major causes of coronary heart diseases and heart attack, regular tea may reduce the risk of developing heart problems.

Tea contains high level of catechin. In vitro studies (cell culture in the lab), it’s noted that catechin can inhibit the interaction between dreadful carcinogens and the cells. This gives some hope to finding the cure for cancer some day.

Tea also contains large quantity of natural fluoride. Studies on animals show that tea can effective reduce plaque formation and development of tooth decay. Thus, it seems many famous toothpaste brands have added white tea or green tea into their products to enhance better dental protection.

There are more health benefits but the three above are more prominent and are extensively tested. So getting all of the benefits of a cup of tea everyday is not a bad deal. The emphasis is the word EVERYDAY. Tea is a very natural and healthy drink (than most of the drink available in the market today) but it is still not a miraculous drug that can cure any disease. It takes time to acquire these health benefits. If you heard of Okinawan tea, it’s just a regular green tea. The reason the Okinawans have higher life expectancy is because they drink tea regularly, combining with an active lifestyle.

So if you are stuffing yourself with carbon-based drinks and coffee that over- stimulate you today and make you tired the next day, may be it’s worth to switch to a cup (or more) of tea a day. You can try it for a period of time and if you don’t like it, you can change back to your old habit of soft drink and coffee. I understand tea isn’t for everyone, but you can never know until you try it.