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Today's Daily Health Tip
The Health Benefits of Green Tea
by Jennifer Good
This week, for our featured ingredient, we are taking a closer look at one of the best-known supplements in the world, green tea. It has been touted for everything from weight loss to cancer prevention to longevity. It's used by serious herbalists (who actually understand it), and it's used in some of the most basic formulas in the world such as
One A Day WeightSmart, albeit at meaningless pixie dust levels.
How it Works Green tea antioxidants are of the same family as grape seed and pine bark extracts. They are polyphenols, chief of which are the flavonoids called proanthocyanidins. In green tea, the main proanthocyanidins are the catechins, and the most powerful of the catechins is Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG), found in the high concentrations in green tea. Why don't other teas have similar properties – particularly since many of them come from the same plant, Camellia sinensis? Quite simply, what sets green tea apart is the way it is processed. Green tea leaves are lightly fermented and steamed, which prevents the EGCG compound from being oxidized. By contrast, black and oolong tea leaves are made from heavily fermented leaves, which results in the EGCG being converted into other compounds that are not as effective in preventing and fighting various diseases.
The Benefits The reported benefits of green tea are multitudinous…and well studied. For example, green tea inhibits tumor growth
1 in a variety of cancers including: breast, lung, and prostate cancers. Specifically, the EGCG in green tea works to suppress angiogenesis
2, the growth of blood vessels that tumors need to survive. And if that's not enough -- stopping the growth of cancer at the front end -- green tea polyphenols have been shown to inhibit metastasis
3, the spread of cancer at the back end. And finally, EGCG is the first known natural telomerase inhibitor. That is to say, it eliminates the "immortality" of cancer cells which is their trademark and which makes them so deadly. The bottom line is that green tea is particularly effective in destroying the causes of leukemia, prostate cancer, breast cancer, and seems to provide the best protection known in terms of preventing lung cancer. And green tea seems to be able to almost totally prevent cancer causing DNA damage in smokers -- a possible explanation as to why the Japanese, who are among the world's heaviest smokers, have such a low incidence of lung cancer.
And the benefits of green tea don't stop there. It has also been shown to be effective in regulating blood sugar
4, reducing cholesterol and triglycerides
5, and in reversing the ravages of heart disease. (Incidentally, the Japanese, who drink large amounts of green tea, have some of the lowest rates of cardiovascular disease in the world too.)
And finally, green tea has great benefits for the brain as well. It serves as an effective MAO inhibitor. It also protects against brain-cell death from glucose oxidase, over-production of nitric oxide, and it lowers the amount of free iron reaching the brain (a bad thing). The net result is that there are strong indications that green tea extract may play a major role in protecting against both Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease.
One important thing to note on green tea is that you should never mix it with any form of dairy. A new study published in Europe shows that having milk with your tea totally negates the health benefits of drinking tea -- whether green, white, or black. It turns out that the casein in milk blocks the catechins in tea. So, just make sure you don't use green tea supplements while consuming dairy products (other than whey). It would seem that you're wasting your money.
6 For more about the effects of green tea and cancer,
click here.
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(1) http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/news/20040315/green-tea-cancer-fighting
(2) http://www.the-aps.org/press/journal/08/8.htm
(3) http://clincancerres.aacrjournals.org
(4 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2210/4/18
(5) http://jn.nutrition.org
(6 http://www.jonbarron.org/natural-health/bl070127/blog-tea-alternative 
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