Tea’s Healthy Benefits
The Health Benefits of Tea
A cup of tea eases frazzled nerves, helps your heart, and may even help fight cancer.
By Jeanie Lerche Davis
WebMD FeatureReviewed by Louise Chang, MD
It’s a rite of summer, setting out the sun tea jar. With all the health benefits of black tea, sun tea is even more welcome than ever. There’s compelling evidence that tea reduces the risk of heart disease, and possibly even helps prevent cancer and Alzheimer’s disease.
Indeed, tea is considered a superfood — whether it’s black, green, white, or oolong tea. All those tea types come from the same tea plant, Camellia sinensis. The leaves are simply processed differently. Green tea leaves are not fermented; they are withered and steamed. Black tea and oolong tea leaves undergo crushing and fermenting processes.
All teas from the Camellia plant are rich in polyphenols, antioxidants that detoxify cell-damaging free radicals in the body. Tea has about eight to 10 times the polyphenols found in fruits and vegetables, according to long-time tea researcher John Weisburger, PhD, senior researcher at the Institute for Cancer Prevention in Valhalla, N.Y.
Studies of humans, animals, and petri-dish experiments show that tea is high beneficial to our health. Research suggests that regular tea drinkers — people who drink two cups or more a day — have less heart disease and stroke, lower total and LDL cholesterol, and recover from heart attacks faster. There’s also evidence that tea may help fight ovarian and breast cancers.
Tea also helps soothe stress and keep us relaxed. One British study found that people who drank black tea were able to de-stress faster than those who drank a fake tea substitute. The tea drinkers had lower levels of cortisol, a stress hormone.
Click here for The Secret Ingredient in Tea!
Tea, Healthy ingredient
July 25th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
[...] researcher at the Institute for Cancer Prevention in Valhalla, NY … article continues at Brick ONeil brought to you by cancer.medtrials.info and [...]
July 25th, 2007 at 9:59 pm
Very insightful. I’m glad you made the point that ANY kind of tea is great for your health. Many people think only green tea is good for you because of the publicity it gets.
Great article
Jeremy
http://www.crazyfortea.com
July 26th, 2007 at 10:05 am
Thanks Jeremy! I was unaware that all Teas are good for you, until I read the article. Lets hope there’s a New Tea Revolution!
August 9th, 2007 at 11:35 pm
I am a tea addict:)!