Your morning Cuppa might be lengthening your lifespan!
If you want to live longer, you might want to make yourself a nice big cup of tea.
According to a European Journal of Preventive Cardiology study, a regular tea habit might be just the ticket to a longer, healthier life.
Tea drinkers have been found not only to have a lower risk for cardiovascular disease but of all causes of death as well.
The study took 100,902 people with no history of heart attack, stroke, or cancer.
It divided them into two groups: frequent tea drinkers (three or more times a week) and never or occasional tea drinkers (less than three times a week) and then followed-up for an average of 7.3 years.
Regular tea drinkers had a lower risk of heart disease incidents and stroke (39%) and fatal heart disease with stroke (56%). They experienced a decreased risk of all causes of death (29%) compared to never or non-regular tea drinkers.
The reason for this might be the main bioactive compounds in tea.
They're called polyphenols, and they're powerful antioxidants.
They protect against free radicals, the destabilizing molecules that can cause a damaging chain reaction in cells and are believed to contribute to diabetes, cancer, and heart disease.
They're also thought to reduce inflammation, lower blood sugar, prevent blood clots, and aid digestion, among many other benefits.
But your body can't store them for long, so you need to keep up your tea habit if you want the effects.
The study linked regular tea drinking to a longer life expectancy, with the average number of extended years being 1.26.
Not only that but people had better health during those years.
Just imagine what you could do with all that time!
Here are some things people have done in a year :
- Run or walk across the US
- Sail the world
- Pay off debt
- Raise millions for charity
- Plant a forest
- Conquer your fear
- Read 300 books
And here are some famous personalities (real and fictional) known to love tea:
- Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Agatha Christie
- Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey
- Pierce Brosnan
- Ozzy Osbourne
- John Lennon
- The Mad Hatter, Alice in Wonderland
- Hobbits, The Lord of the Rings
- Arthur Dent, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
See if you can figure out who's real and who isn't.
But before you get too excited, the tea with the best effect was green tea.
Green tea is processed differently from black tea, which preserves more of its protective polyphenols.
Black tea is fully fermented, which oxidizes polyphenols, possibly causing them to lose their antioxidant effects.
Also, (and this is the kicker for me) black tea is often served with milk, which research has shown may counteract its beneficial effects.
Gender-specific analyses also showed different outcomes, with men having much better results than women.
But don't worry, ladies, one reason for this might be that women already had a much lower rate of heart disease and stroke with a lower death rate from both.
Since the study is ongoing, they'll be expecting more comprehensive results for women over time.
While doctors are confident enough to recommend lifestyle and dietary guidelines from the study, there are some caveats.
If you drink black tea with loads of milk and sugar, if you smoke with your tea or drink it as a hangover cure, this study might not make much difference for you.
However, if you love green tea, drink it regularly, and have a relatively healthy lifestyle, keep up the excellent work!
Drinking green tea every day might be a great addition to your health routine and give you extra time to enjoy your life.