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Green Tea Health Benefits And Advantages Of Drinking Green Tea Green tea is a variety of tea that is indigenous to the Far East and is the standard for tea in some countries like Japan where black tea is considered exotic. This variety of tea has been getting more acclaim as a means to better health. This is because of the presence of phytochemicals in it that are quite beneficial to humans. The benefits include reduction of cholesterol levels, increased fat oxidation, and the presence of several different antioxidants.
Of all of these benefits, probably the most important is the presence of antioxidants.
When the body is performing its usual metabolic processes, the chemical reactions of metabolism can sometimes end up in the production of free radicals.
These are a highly reactive species of chemicals and if they react with DNA, will destroy cells or cause cancerous growths. Antioxidants latch on to and sweep up these free radicals rendering them almost inert until they are excreted from the body.
However, as with most herbal remedies, green tea is not without its share of controversy. This is probably because the initial benefits from green tea were explained in the context of Ancient Chinese Medicine. This is a method of medicine that modern medicine cannot relate to and, in all fairness, does go beyond the realm of known scientific fact at times.
It is for this reason that many of the benefits and health claims from the use of green tea are regularly debunked.
Green tea’s established benefits come in the form of antioxidants like catechins. It also contains ascorbic acid, carotenoids, tocopherols, and many essential minerals like zinc and magnesium to name a few.
Overall, in studies that were conducted, people generally showed overall better health after consuming green tea than people who didn’t consume it or consumed black tea instead.
It is worth noting that green tea itself doesn’t have any cholesterol reducing effects but with the addition of theaflavin from black tea was useful in reducing the amount of cholesterol in the body.
Curiously, there are some promising animal trials that have been conducted that show that green tea can reduce the symptoms of Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. In some studies in mice, it was even shown that green tea stopped the advancing neural damage and in some cases, stimulated the regrowth of some neurons. This is a condition that may not be absolutely applicable to humans though it is always useful to try.
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