Bella Adams
Green tea is healthy and helps to lose weight. It also boosts fat burning. We have summarized everything worth knowing for you.
Miracle cure, weight loss booster, detox turbo, and protection against cancer – a lot is being researched and written about green tea. Myths or truth? As always, when food is stylized as a panacea, one should be cautious. But the fact is that green tea has many health-promoting ingredients.
It contains so-called antioxidants, which fight free radicals. These enter our bodies from the environment (for example, through exhaust fumes, tobacco, or alcohol) and cause damage.
They age the cells and, in the worst case, can cause cancer. According to studies, green tea, drunk daily, protects against cell damage and premature aging.
This is why green tea is so healthy
If you drink three to four cups of green tea a day, you are doing your body some good. However, it should definitely be green tea of high quality, preferably from organic cultivation.
It is considered a gentle stimulant, health elixir, and fountain of youth, inhibits inflammatory processes, and protects our cells from attacks by free radicals due to the high number of healthy polyphenols and flavonoids. Therefore, green tea is not only interesting for cosmetics but is also being studied specifically as a means of cancer prevention.
Swiss scientists from brain research also found that extracts in green tea improve the connectivity of the brain, which makes the brain regions interact better, and increases thinking performance and memory. In this respect, green tea is also interesting in the context of dementia.
Attention: people with iron deficiency should be careful because green tea inhibits the absorption of iron. Conversely, green tea loses its effect as an antioxidant when consumed together with iron-rich foods (for example, meat, green vegetables such as broccoli and leafy salads, beet, and legumes).
Lose weight with green tea – this is how it works
Green tea is considered an ideal fat killer. Various studies show that green tea plays a major role in fat burning. Green tea promotes the burning of existing fatty tissue by stimulating the conversion of food energy into body heat. Such substances are called thermogenic, they increase the body’s metabolic rate and additionally burn calories.
The bitter substances in green tea, the catechins, also ensure that heat release and fat oxidation in the body are increased. In a study by Chantré and Lairon, for example, the consumption of green tea reduced the weight and waistline of participants by five percent after twelve weeks.
The tea leaves also have a high caffeine content. This activates the sympathetic nervous system and mobilizes the storage of fat, which boosts fat digestion. Further research proved that large amounts of green tea support fat burning because carbohydrates are released more slowly. This keeps insulin levels stable. Another plus: green tea cleanses the stomach and helps digest fatty foods.
Not all fat is the same. How unhealthy fat deposits depend on where they are located. The most unhealthy is belly fat, which has been linked to elevated cholesterol, risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and the likelihood of developing asthma or dementia.
Dr. Sudathip Sae-tan and his colleagues at Pennsylvania State University in the U.S., in a 16-week study of mice, found that consumption of decaffeinated green tea along with regular running exercise could reduce abdominal fat by nearly 37 percent. Body weight was reduced by about 30 percent, and energy metabolism was optimized.
Green tea, an anti-aging agent?
In Asia, the positive effect of green tea on the skin has long been known. In cosmetics, it acts as an ingredient in creams and skin care products. It also improves the skin’s structure from the inside.
This was confirmed by Prof. Dr. Ulrike Heinrich from the University of Witten. She examined in representative study women aged between 35 and 60, which drank twelve weeks long each day a liter of green tea each. With clear results: the skin’s moisture and protective function as well as its elasticity and density increased significantly, and at the same time the skin was less rough.
In addition to this anti-aging effect, the skin’s own sun protection was increased. The study examined green tea flavonoids. These secondary plant substances are responsible for improving the appearance of the skin. They are absorbed into the blood, where they increase oxygen uptake and stimulate blood flow to the skin.
Caution: Green tea may be contaminated with pollutants
Studies have shown that green tea is often contaminated with harmful substances, especially pesticides, and herbicides. This is particularly true of tea from China. In a 2015 study by Stiftung Warentest, only five of 25 tea varieties scored “good”; none was completely free of pollutants. The potentially carcinogenic substance pyrrolizidine alkaloid was found in nine of the teas. High-quality organic products are more expensive than conventional tea, but the best alternative is to really benefit from its healthy properties.
