Healthy aging

Tea time — 10 amazing ways tea helps keep you young

by Dixie Mills, MD

• Protection against stress and depression
• Protection against weight gain and diabetes
• Protection against infections and chronic disease
• Support for heart and bone health

I always loved it when, in old science fiction movies, the solution for vanquishing aliens or monsters turned out to be something simple, like sea water or sunlight. And as a practitioner, I get the same thrill when the latest medical discovery is actually a remarkably commonplace substance. This time, it’s tea.

Tea, known by botanists as Camellia sinensis, has been revered by many cultures for thousands of years — plenty of time to make note of its positive effects on health. But now there is evidence that drinking tea truly does help you live a longer — and better — life: emerging science and recent research show that tea (black, green, oolong, and other varieties — and the different ingredients each can contain), has distinct effects at the cellular level that enhance health and slow down the natural aging process

Specifically, tea has the power to:

• Relieve certain health-related symptoms
• Reduce the risk of developing — and dying from — a long list of illnesses
• Prevent chronic diseases, as well as those related to lifestyle, by reducing inflammation
• Promote wellness and improved quality of life

You might ask, How could it be that something as simple — and affordable! — as tea has such potent health benefits? Well, in truth, the list of molecules in diverse varieties of tea is lengthy, and their chemical interactions with the body are quite complex. Researchers have pinpointed a number of individual constituents as responsible for tea’s wide-ranging health advantages, and now, a tremendous amount of new research is filling in the details.

It’s more than cozy comfort: tea warms you physically and emotionally

Drinking tea is comforting and relaxing, so a direct correlation between tea consumption and better health just adds new benefits to this cherished habit. The newest scientific inquiries are helping define the specific actions that tea has on our bodies and our longevity.

Let’s start with the effects you can feel because in some ways, those are the most noticeable and immediate benefits. While we’ve learned from experience that a nice, hot “cuppa” can help calm and relax us, research shows that black tea actually promotes quicker recovery from stress events at a physiological level. Because this effect is measured by the speedier return to normal levels of stress hormones, it could also confer significant downstream benefits, such as reduction of adrenal imbalance and risk of heart disease.

If you drink several daily cups of green tea — a common practice all across Asia — you may have less psychological stress overall. And studies on older people show that green tea can also reduce the prevalence of depressive symptoms and even improve psychological well-being.

Health span effects you can measure — and weigh

As the prevalence of obesity and diabetes edges up and up, it’s a relief to know that good old tea can help with both conditions. While a study of instant tea showed it can help stabilize blood sugar, other research indicates another type of tea — oolong — helps control the blood sugar effect that carbohydrates have on people with type 2 diabetes.

Green tea contains some caffeine, like most teas, but it also contains phytochemicals with powerful antioxidant properties called catechins. Researchers think both these substances can help increase your ability to lose abdominal fat while exercising, and may even reduce triglyceride levels in people who don’t exercise at all!

Green tea is liver-friendly all the way around. It helps you metabolize fats, and may even stop the build-up of fatty deposits in the liver. But I think the most interesting, and youth-preserving, effect is how green tea can improve your body’s all-important ability to detoxify well.

The catechins found most abundantly in green tea — but also present in black, oolong, and white teas — ramp up levels of key protective enzymes. The protective effects of catechins need more exploration, but to date these enzymes have been found to help balance the two stages of liver detox (phase I and phase II), reduce toxic effects of reactive intermediate substances created during the detoxification process, and neutralize certain cancer-causing molecules.

A kettle-full of immune support

We all try to avoid catching seasonal illnesses, like colds and flu, but it still happens. When I’m achy or have a scratchy throat, I find a soothing cup of hot tea hits the spot. But now there is scientific proof that this benefit transcends the psychological. Green tea can actually reduce cold and flu symptoms and get you back on your feet faster. In fact, people who drink green tea just seem to get fewer colds overall.

The tea plant contains ingredients that work individually to help you fight germs and bugs, like L-theanine, which is thought to activate the infection-fighting T-cells in your immune system. Theanine is found most abundantly in fine green teas that are shade-grown, but again, in all types of true tea.

Other tea ingredients have effects that are anti-inflammatory and antiviral — polyphenols or catechins such as epigallocatechin gallate or EGCG. In theory, the ability to suppress inflammation may translate into less autoimmune activity in cells exposed to EGCG, accounting for lower incidence of autoimmune diseases like dry mouth (xerostoma) and rheumatoid arthritis in green tea-loving populations.

When taken with antibiotics, green tea has been found to effectively supercharge them and help them knock out “superbugs” and bacterial strains previously resistant to treatment. White tea — the new kid on the block here in the West — can also protect against bacterial infections.

Tea can shrink your risk of chronic disease

In Japan, where even the preparation of tea is an ancient and beloved ritual, green tea is a household staple. Several studies there focusing on its health effects offer some encouraging results: along with helping prevent cells from becoming cancerous, green tea may also help prevent recurrence of the disease in cancer patients. Emerging research around the globe points to the power green and black teas may have to prevent gastric cancer, as well as cancers of the blood, breast, ovaries, colon, mouth, and prostate.

Drinking tea regularly may help ease another common fear many of us have about aging: loss of cognitive function. Research shows that both black and green teas protect against Alzheimer’s disease (AD), and guard against the memory loss linked to the tangled plaques that are the telltale hallmarks of AD.

In the prevention and treatment of Parkinson’s disease (PD), a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system, black and green teas both have value. Black tea decreases your risk of getting PD in the first place — by a staggering 71% — while green tea is able to slow down the progression of this devastating disease.

Tea for the heart: more than an ounce of prevention

If you’ve followed recent health trends, you know that the greatest overall threat to women’s longevity is cardiovascular disease. We’ve learned a lot about how diet and lifestyle can contribute to this degenerative condition, and now we’re starting to pinpoint effective ways to help prevent it altogether. Handily tea fits right into a healthy lifestyle focused on avoiding cardiovascular disease.

For people who drink lots of green tea, like the Japanese and others, there is a measurable reduction in the risk of death from heart disease. The polyphenols in green tea have the ability to facilitate blood flow through the vessels, and this circulatory effect can actually reduce both incidence of cardiovascular disease, and the risk of dying from it.

Stronger bones means longer life

Natural bone health also enhances a woman’s health span as the years advance. Again, tea comes to the rescue with well-documented, bone-conserving benefits. For starters, drinking tea is linked to higher bone mineral density (BMD) as well as a reduction in hip fractures, and preservation of the hip structure in general. And tea helps protect against bone loss even after menopause.

We want women to understand that bone tissue is intended to naturally break down and build back up throughout your life. Green tea can perform double duties in this process because it helps stimulate mineralization to generate bone formation, while simultaneously inhibiting the formation of osteoclasts, the cells that remove bone tissue.

Can tea make you younger?

A large amount of recent, cutting-edge science has focused on the factors that influence our ability to grow old gracefully. Now, tea is not a “fountain of youth,” but it might make a difference in the rate at which you age. Several studies show that black tea, and especially green tea, can help protect your DNA’s telomeres. Telomeres cap the very ends of your chromosomes, protecting the genetic information they contain, and by preserving them from fraying, ingredients found in tea can, in essence, help you stay “younger” than your chronological years.

Additional studies show that tea can support healthy aging by promoting eye and oral health. Specifically, tea has been associated with the preservation of retinal function in the setting of glaucoma and ischemia, as well as protection against gum disease.

Invite tea into your lifestyle

The body of scientific evidence proving the health advantages of tea continues to blossom more each year. As a practitioner, I think it’s been fun to watch this familiar, everyday drink — enjoyed for thousands of years and revered as an elixir of longevity — morph into the latest medical marvel. But it makes perfect sense! When we look at the cultures where tea drinking has been most embedded throughout human history, the distinct health benefits of tea are apparent.

So today, why not fill the kettle with fresh, cold water and bring it to a rolling boil. Choose a nice fragrant variety, either loose or in a teabag, and pour yourself a cup of steaming, soothing — and healthy — tea. Let it steep for awhile, then sit back and enjoy the moment, knowing that this preventive lifestyle habit might be one that helps keep you as young as you feel.

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References & further reading on tea and healthy aging

 

Last Modified Date: 04/20/2011
Principal Author: Dixie Mills, MD