Suppose you happen to be a tea connoisseur or simply a fellow caffeine enthusiast exploring your variety of options. In that case, this article is your cup of tea! Most people may recognize it as the tea itself or Matcha (its powdered form) like that in your regular Starbucks drink.
Nevertheless, there’s more to just the enriched flavor and blissful scent of green tea. It, too, packs a punch of various health benefits. This article entails some of the top health benefits your body will thank you for. So, get your notes ready, and let’s pour right into it!
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Mitigating Risks of Cancer
Like most teas, green tea is abundant in polyphenols that are natural compounds that aid in combating cancer and helps reduces inflammations. Additionally, green tea also packs a whole punch of EGCG (epigallocatechin-3-gallate), powerful antioxidants that maintain cell functionality by protecting cell damage.
As a matter of fact, ECGC is one of the main health-contributing compounds that enables green tea to be one of the best tea-based medicine to date. Some cancer types that green tea can mitigate the risks on of it include breast cancer, prostate cancer, and colorectal cancer.
Health tip: Try not to add milk into your green tea. This way, it keeps its antioxidant levels at their peak, unlike that when milk is added (as milk does degrade antioxidants in teas when mixed together).
Helps You Lose Weight (Safely)
Green tea is known to help the human body naturally lose weight without trying out peculiar supplements on the market. How you may ask? Well, there are two main driving factors of weight loss in green teas: catechins and caffeine.
As you may already tell by now, catechins are multi-beneficial compounds. In this case, catechins may contribute to metabolic reactions to produce energy by breaking down excess body fat, eventually leading to weight loss. Metabolism is the process of converting ingested food to energy in the human body. On the other hand, caffeine essentially synergizes with catechins to enable higher metabolic rates to allow the body to lose a few pounds over a certain period of time.
Though increases in metabolic rates caused by green tea aren’t significant enough to be clinically effective, it’s still a great way to get some energy going with just a few teacup sips and can be perfectly coupled with more effective weight-loss methods such as regular exercises.
A Healthy and Happy Heart
Heart-related diseases such as strokes and heart attacks are among the most leading contributors to mortality rates in the world. Research has justified that consuming green tea may help minimize risk factors such as improving total cholesterol as well as LDL cholesterol (the bad ones).
Green tea’s abundance of powerful antioxidants significantly helps prevent LDL cholesterols from oxidation, which prevents processes that lead to heart diseases. As a matter of fact, studies have shown that green tea consumption has lowered the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease by 31 percent!
Burning Down Those Fats
Green tea has been notoriously known for its fat-burning and metabolic-boosting properties. In the most credible fat loss supplements you find, green tea may very well be on the ingredients list. And all these properties have been enabled by the almighty stimulant, caffeine. In addition, caffeine can also boost body performance by stimulating fatty acids to be used in energy production.
Helps Upgrade your Brain a Notch
Sadly, it does not give you the 2.0 version of Einstein’s brain, but green tea does help improve your brain’s overall performance level. The key ingredient here is a stimulant we all know as caffeine.
A great plus about green tea is the fact that it does not contain as high of a level of caffeine as coffee but is still able to pack the punch you need to freshen up your senses. The way caffeine keeps us “awake” is the fact that it is well capable of blocking inhibitory neurotransmitters known as adenosine.
By doing so, it boosts neurotransmitter concentrations (including dopamine and norepinephrine) and the firing of neurons. Aside from that, caffeine is also a key contributor to improving various brain functions such as alertness, mood control, reflexes, and memory retention.
Another brain-upgrading compound in green teas is an amino acid known as L-theanine. This compound boosts the activity rate of GABA (an inhibitory neurotransmitter) that counters anxiety as an entirety and increases the production of dopamine and brain alpha waves (helps you feel calm and dampen stress). So, if you’re looking for a switch from coffee beans, we definitely recommend giving green tea a go!
Helps Decrease Bad Breath
No matter the occasion, may it be when you’re gathered with your loved ones, friends, and family at home or outside the house, a good breath is an absolute necessity. You want to make sure you can talk with peace of mind, knowing your breath doesn’t wreak havoc on others’ noses.
Green tea contains plenty of catechins, which are compounds that can slow down bacteria growth, including Streptococcus mutans (responsible for plaque build-ups. A great plus for oral health, don’t you think?
Aids in Preventing Type 2 Diabetes
Type 2 diabetes is one of the most prevalent conditions that affect about 1 in 10 people in the US. Type 2 diabetes is caused by the rise in blood sugar levels due to the lack of insulin. The lack of insulin can be caused by one of two things: insulin resistance or the inability of the body to produce insulin.
Research indicates that consuming green tea may increase sensitivity to insulin which in turn may help reduce blood sugar levels down to a normal state. Another study conducted in Japan indicates that green tea consumers lowered their risk of having type 2 diabetes by a staggering forty-two percent!
Helps Slow Down Brain Aging
Aging is an inevitable process in human life. As we grow older, our brain functions tend to degrade over time. However, green tea may actually help you improve brain functions in the short run and protect its functionality levels. Some of the common neurodegenerative diseases that occur following aging include Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.
Alzheimer’s disease is the common culprit for dementia in the elderly or old adults. On the other hand, Parkinson’s disease essentially kills off neurons that produce dopamine in the brain. Dopamine is an essential neurotransmitter responsible for relaying messages from one nerve cell to another.
Fortunately, catechins, the compounds found in green tea, may provide neurons some form of protection, which may possibly mitigate the chances of getting dementia.
What you Should Know Before Choosing to Drink Green Tea
Like coins and all things, there are always two sides. Green teas may have a handful of health benefits which are by no means a good reason to drink them. Still, there are a few considerations you should know regarding the effects of drinking green tea.
Sensitivity to Caffeine
Suppose you happen to be less tolerant or intolerant to caffeine. In that case, we suggest toning down the green tea concentrations or avoiding drinking caffeine entirely. People have individual responses to caffeine sensitivity. Some of these responses include anxiety, nausea, stomach aches, and insomnia after drinking green tea.
Potential Liver and Kidney Damage
Though it has rarely occurred, sky-high concentrations of green tea may cause liver and kidney damage, especially when you consume over 8 cups of green tea in a day.
Increases Blood Pressure
The fact that green tea naturally contains stimulants such as caffeine may cause elevated blood pressure and faster heart rates. Suppose you have underlying health issues related to blood pressure and your cardiovascular system. In that case, we highly recommend asking for expert advice from your doctor on whether green tea is a green light for you to consume.
Conclusion
As we now know, green tea is more than just your regular cup of tea, with its contentful supply of antioxidants, stimulants, and catechins to keep your health in check while improving bodily functions such as your brain and heart. It can also serve as your partner in crime for your weight and fat loss journey while having lower caffeine concentrations than that of coffee (how convenient!).
Green tea is also an enriched source of antioxidants, which reduces the risks of diseases including cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and diabetes. When in doubt on whether your body can tolerate green tea properties such as caffeine, consult a medical expert for what’s for your best interest in health and overall wellbeing.