Alternative Health Blog

Another positive about green tea in Anderson’s view: It contains amino acid molecules called thiamine that “can be quite calming to the brain.” This relaxing effect seems to run counter to the fact that green tea’s active ingredients include caffeine. The caffeine is less the typical cup of coffee or soda, but it is still, well, caffeine.

“The caffeine effect is immediate while thiamine needs to build up over time,” said Anderson. “Only regular green tea drinkers will get the calming effect, and the thiamine sort of balances out the caffeine.”

The research on the health benefits of green tea is burgeoning. Earlier this year, researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington reported that women who drank one or more cups per day of green tea reduced ovarian cancer risk by 54 percent.  Even women who drank green tea occasionally enjoyed decreased risk. This protectiveness is even more significant considering the difficulty of detecting ovarian cancer until it is advanced and less treatable.

The Hutch Center scientists noted green tea has high levels of epigallocatechin-3-gallate or EGCG, a powerful antioxidant shown in lab studies to inhibit ovarian cancer growth. Additional studies connect green tea’s EGCG level and reduced risk for several other cancers, including breast cancer (in mice experiments at the University of Mississippi) and colorectal cancer (according to a large study of Chinese women).

Anderson said some cancer patients drink green tea to help offset the intended ravages (killing some normal cells as a byproduct of destroying cancer cells) of chemotherapy and radiation.

A major Japanese study concluded that individuals who drink at least at pint of green tea per day appear to significantly decrease their risk of death from heart disease, especially from cardiac episodes earlier than life expectancy would predict. The 2006 research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, offered that the common green tea habit among Japanese adults might go a long way in explaining why the mortality rate from heart disease and stroke is about 30 percent lower in Japan than the United States.

EGCG is considered a substance that prevents cells from damage and premature aging, which is no doubt why it has become a favorite of beauty and cosmetics manufacturers. But there is no research to show whether topical application of green tea extracts have the same effect as consuming the tea.

Anderson said one of the first things a naturopathic physician determines about medicinal plants and herbs is whether there is a toxicity level for the substance. He said green tea presents no such dangers, especially as a brewed tea. He acknowledged that someone would have to take “extremely large” amounts of green tea extract to cause any toxic effect. He did include a few cautions: The caffeine in green tea might still adversely affect someone with uncontrolled high blood pressure, similar to coffee. And he said some people become nauseated when they drink green tea.

But, for most of us, going green will be a healthy move.

Bob Condor blogs for Alternative Health Journal every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.