The Health Benefits of Tea
 
BY ROSEMARY ELLIS

Tea combats heart disease, lowers cholesterol and staves off several types of cancer while protecting skin and strengthening bones and teeth.

Besides having practically no calories, no fat and no salt, two cups of true tea are as rich in flavonoids as a serving of vegetables. Drink tea strong and freshly brewed, because research shows that bottled and powdered varieties can be less effective. Or try eating it. Cooking with Green Tea, by Ying Chang Compestine, and Eat Tea, by Joanna Pruess and John Harney, give recipes in which tea is a key ingredient. Here's how a daily dose of four to six cups will hedge your bets.

A Healthy Heart Some of the most persuasive tea research links tea to lower risks of heart disease, stroke and high cholesterol. Numerous clinical trials as well as large population studies have found that regular tea drinkers are as much as 44 percent less likely to suffer a heart attack than the general population, and those who have had heart attacks are more likely to recover. Researchers at Boston University recently found that black tea appears to repair blood-vessel damage in people who have coronary-artery disease. And at the USDA, a just-completed study that controlled everything subjects ate and drank found that consistent tea-drinking significantly lowered LDL cholesterol (the bad kind) without decreasing helpful HDL cholesterol.

Beautiful Skin Tea helps prevent sunburn and even skin cancer. At the University of Arizona, researchers found that drinking hot black tea appears to protect against squamous-cell carcinoma. Wearing tea may be just as useful: studies show that green-tea compounds in skin lotions may protect against, and even reverse, sun damage.

Cancer Prevention Both clinical and large-population studies suggest black or green tea reduces the risk of a host of cancers, in particular, stomach and colorectal. "There's a lot of evidence that oxidative stress is what damages DNA, causing it to mutate and become cancer," explains Jeffrey Blumberg, a professor of nutrition at Tufts University. "Catechins seem to promote something we call programmed cell death: when an injured cell can't repair itself, it commits suicide instead of becoming cancerous."

Strong Bones and Teeth Other studies report increased bone-density measurements among tea drinkers, possibly due to the fluoride in tea, coupled with the catechins. Tea, especially oolong, has been shown to suppress bacterial growth in the mouth, and it helps to prevent cavities.

Of course, like anything, tea has its drawbacks. "Caffeine is caffeine is caffeine," says Blumberg. "You just get a smaller dose in tea than in coffee." (Black tea has about half as much as coffee; green, a third. But you can decaffeinate tea, which lessens its healthful effects only slightly, by immersing a tea bag or ball in hot water for thirty seconds, throwing that water out and then brewing again.) One caveat: avoid taking medicine or vitamins with tea, since its active ingredients can interfere with those in some medications. Tea can also hinder iron absorption, though drinking it with lemon or only between meals will mitigate that effect.