Understanding Green Tea

While there is no doubt that green tea is has valid medical properties, people need to understand that the green tea used in clinical tests is not the same green tea sold in a grocery store or even health food stores. In fact, it is not even the same green tea that is sold in Chinese pharmacies. Like most herbs, green tea looses its effectiveness over time. A health food store may purchase high quality leaves from a reputable, organic, supplier, but as time passes, the herb dries out, the oils evaporate, and the heath benefits are lost.

Green Tea is linked to “The French Paradox.” Researchers have been puzzled for years by the fact that the average French person consumes a diet rich in fat, but they have lower incidences of heart disease than Americans. Researchers looked for the one compound in their diet that could explain the factor. The answer was found in red wine, which contains resveratrol, a polyphenol. These limit the negative effects of smoking and consuming a fatty diet.

In a 1997 study, The University of Kansas’s researchers concluded that EGCG was twice as powerful as resveratrol in preventing heart disease. This may explain why the rate of heart disease among Japanese men is low, even though approximately seventy-five percent are smokers.