BioQuakes

AP Biology class blog for discussing current research in Biology

Drinking Tea Can Extend Your Lifetime

An article was written in the journal of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and refers to the recent work that some Chinese scientists have recently discovered: habitually drinking tea contributed to living a longer, healthier life. The data comes from 100,902 Chinese participants with no record of heart attack, stroke, or cancer. They were separated into two groups: those that drank tea habitually around and those that did not. The participants followed up for a median of 7.3 years per participant.

Generally, habitual tea consumption was linked to “more healthy years of life and longer life expectancy.”

The analyzed data reveals that “50-year habitual tea drinkers would develop coronary heart disease and stroke 1.41 years later and live 1.26 years longer than those who never or seldom drank tea.” And in comparison to non-habitual tea drinkers, habitual tea consumers “had a 20% lower risk of incident heart disease and stroke, 22% lower risk of fatal heart disease and stroke, and 15% decreased risk of all-cause death.” In addition, tea drinkers “had a 39% lower risk of incident heart disease and stroke, 56% lower risk of fatal heart disease and stroke, and 29% decreased risk of all-cause death compared to consistent never or non-habitual tea drinkers.”

The data points to the fact that drinking tea can certainly make one’s life healthier, decreasing the odds of potential heart issues in humans in the long run.

Dr. Dongfeng Gu, one of the main authors of the article, noted that “frequent tea intake over an extended period may be necessary for the cardioprotective effect.” The other authors found that green tea was the most beneficial, as it was linked with “approximately 25% lower risks for incident heart disease and stroke, fatal heart disease and stroke, and all-cause death.”

Green tea is a rich source of polyphenols, which “protect against cardiovascular disease and its risk factors including high blood pressure and dyslipidaemia.” High blood pressure usually exercises more strain on one’s blood vessels and heart and eliminating the risk to get high blood pressure can extend one’s life.

Drinking tea has shown to increase one’s lifespan and decrease potential heart issues. The ingredients of tea, specifically polyphenols in green tea, defend against the risk of heart diseases and problems.

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22 Comments

  1. saadoplasm

    I enjoyed this article because I guess I like a few posts about tea on Instagram and now I see so many different tea company ads and posts. A lot of times, these posts compare coffee to tea and how since tea has less caffeine than coffee, but also has a chemical that makes you feel calm, it results in feeling both aware yet calm at the same time. They also mention how antioxidants in tea clear out your system and make you feel better throughout the day. I had not heard about tea making you live longer until this article, so that’s very interesting. I’m curious to see which teas are better for different aspects of your health. This article also discusses how the way you prepare your tea can affect how much the tea benefits you physically. Cool! https://www.health.harvard.edu/press_releases/health-benefits-linked-to-drinking-tea

  2. glovcose

    I found this article really interesting and it is really cool to see that something as simple as drinking tea can have an impact on your life. I found this article that talks about how drinking too much tea can also be dangerous. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/side-effects-of-tea
    Drinking too much tea can lead to issues such as low iron levels, poor sleep habits, headaches and many other issues.

  3. trnayon

    Michaelchondria, this is a very informative blog post. I have heard that tea is very good for your health when you’re sick, but now I know that it is beneficial to drink tea habitually. I have also heard many bonuses of drinking green tea, like boosting your metabolism. Furthering my research, I found out that there are many antioxidants and nutrients that have a powerful effect on the body like improved brain function and a lower risk of cancer! This site lists many benefits and explains how it is beneficial. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/top-10-evidence-based-health-benefits-of-green-tea#section1

  4. andygen

    Wow this is so interesting Michaelchondria! An interesting idea for you to research would be comparing tea consumption in countries to their respective life expectancies and cardiovascular disease rate. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html The CIA states that Japan, Singapore, Macau, and Monaco are the countries with the highest life expectancies (despite the fact that Macau is an autonomous region of China as opposed to a sovereign state), and these countries are also among the most tea-centric countries in the world. The opposing argument would be: why are countries in the Middle East and South America which consume tea at comparable or sometimes higher rates have significantly lower life expectancy? I think the answer to this might be related to what you stated about specific varieties of tea which are more popular in certain cultures. While there are certainly other external factors such as crime, poverty, and health insurance, I do believe there is some relation between the specific types of teas and their efficacy.

  5. Ethanol

    It is super neat that something as simple as habitually drinking tea can have such a noticeable affect the risk of developing heart disease. I wonder how tea can be made more effective at these defensive qualities. Also could these effects translate to other food or drink. Could these properties of tea be isolated in order to be made into supplements? Science also suggests that green tea can help stimulate weight loss. https://www.consumerreports.org/dieting-weight-loss/truth-about-green-tea-for-weight-loss/

  6. actrevationenergy

    Amazing post! I found it fascinating how tea apparently lowers the risk of heart disease. I wonder if tea has an overall negative effect on the world or positive. Here is an article about the harmful effects of TEA. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-7575071/Thousands-children-suffering-burns-tea-coffee-health-experts-issue-warning.html

  7. tytybox

    This is a great post. I like how you decided to focus your post on how something as small and simple as drinking tea can help lead to a longer life. I wonder what about polyphenols, on the molecular level, allows them to protect against heart disease. This article I found: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3651847/ goes deep into what polyphenols are and how they help the heart.

  8. liambilicalcord

    Awesome article! Being half Irish we have tea pumping through our veins at this point. I got very excited to hear that we all may be a little better off from drinking all of our tea, but I recently learned that green tea has an even bigger impact! This article from CNN (https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/09/health/tea-live-longer-wellness/index.html) said that the impact of drinking black tea was statistically insignificant however people that drink green tea are over 20% less likely to have a heart attack or stroke! I guess I’ll be telling all my family to start drinking green tea now. Even if it is worse than black tea :).

  9. jednetic

    That’s really cool! I also just read an article about how coffee contributes to a longer lasting life. This isn’t 100% proven though so the article doesn’t recommend that you dramatically increase your coffee intake. Something interesting about this article was that decaf coffee also contributed to longevity; this means that there are other compounds in coffee that contribute to better health.

    You can read more here. Great work Michael!

    https://www.livescience.com/62970-coffee-risk-of-death.html

  10. alleele

    Interesting article! I wonder about other factors, such as the temperature of the tea that is being consumed. I found an article (https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/20/health/hot-tea-linked-to-higher-cancer-risk-study-intl/index.html) that says that drinking very hot tea every day actually increases risk of cancer, specifically esophageal cancer. I also wonder how the amount of tea consumed effects its benefits.

  11. abbyogenesis

    As a fellow tea drinker this blog post is amazing! I am so happy to know that not only is tea enjoyable but it is also beneficial to my health as well. This article https://healthland.time.com/2012/09/04/13-reasons-to-love-tea/ not only talks about the benefits in tea reducing heart diseases, chances of a stroke, etc but it also talks about how tea drinking can lessen the chance of neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s! Showing that tea is beneficial both to the mind, body and soul!

  12. ionizingjadeation

    Great blog post, michaelchondria! I have actually heard a lot about the benefits of drinking tea to one’s health and it was so interesting to read about all of the research regarding the health benefits of habitually drinking tea along with the data to back this hypothesis. I looked more into the health benefits linked to drinking tea and found that according to Qi Sun, assistant professor in the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, all of the health benefits that come from drinking tea is “probably completely offset by adding sugar.” I just thought that this was an interesting statement to consider when looking at the study and data provided in your article.

    https://www.health.harvard.edu/press_releases/health-benefits-linked-to-drinking-tea

  13. Johnomer

    I found this article very interesting because I never thought drinking tea could extent your life expectancy, let alone lead to a healthier life. I was shocked when I read that people who drank tea for 50 years had a 22% lower risk of fatal heart disease and stroke as I didn’t think a drink could have such a big impact on lowering a deadly statistic. I found an article at https://www.today.com/series/one-small-thing/top-10-health-benefits-drinking-tea-t81111 that explained the science behind the benefits of drinking tea. Tea happens to be a rich source of flavonoids, and these flavonoids work to lower blood pressure in your body, which in turn leads to a lower risk of stroke or heart disease.

  14. foodvacuolola

    I saw this blog post and immediately had to read because I love tea and find this so interesting! It is fascinating to think that tea helps so much with cardiovascular issues and helps with developing problems later in life. In the article, I found it says all the same things and the statistics are there. Also, tea is richer in probiotics and vitamins that help with cardiovascular issues and even better than the effects coffee has on ones body. (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/01/09/drinking-tea-regularly-may-help-you-live-longer-healthier-study/2845756001/) Great work, I would have never been aware of how important drinking tea is!

  15. a

    I really liked the information and research you provided in your article. I never knew that drinking tea might help you live longer. I really liked how you provided data and tests. I wonder if there are any other health benefits that tea can provide. Here is a similar article that also provides facts and data to support your article. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.usatoday.com/amp/2845756001

  16. charlaphroditic Englernation

    I enjoyed the article, but I found the data in the second paragraph confusing. You said that people who drank tea developed heart disease 1.41 years later and that they live 1.26 years longer. Longer than who? the average population? Besides that though, I found the article very interesting. I wonder why polyphenols decrease one’s risk of heart disease. I found an article by Joshua Bote from “USAToday.” The article added that tea contains substances called “flavonoids”, which according to the article, “reduce inflammation and improve heart and vascular health’

  17. Alizard Wrat

    This article is extremely intriguing! It’s interesting to see how a drink so simple as tea can truly change someone’s health, especially with their heart. You did a great job explaining which specific ingredients of the tea affected the heart, and the body, in specific beneficial ways, and how this demonstrates which specific type of tea (green) is the most beneficial. One question I had is that since caffeine is linked to some negative side effects, such as anxiety and irregular heartbeat, does the caffeine in regular tea downgrade the positive effects? In order to continue this research, I thought this article might be helpful. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/what-is-caffeine. Overall, a truly great article.

  18. jacuole

    Michaelchondia, thank you for telling us about this research! I never would have thought that tea can have an effect on our lifespans! Many of your listed health concerns that tea consumption combats seem to be related to the heart, and that got me thinking about how my dad always says habitually eating a small amount of dark chocolate is good for the heart. Knowing that chocolate and tea both contain certain levels of caffeine, I found that the beneficial polyphenols we receive from tea come from its caffeine. So according to “The Pros and Cons of Drinking Decaf Tea” (https://www.cupandleaf.com/blog/pros-and-cons-of-drinking-decaf-tea), most decaffeination processes strip the tea of its polyphenols, which means that we’re losing out on the health benefits provided by caffeinated tea!

  19. maggiechondria

    Michael, your research on how habitually drinking tea contribute to living a longer, healthier life was very interesting! Here is a similar article on how drinking tea improves brain health, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190912100945.htm. As said in the article, a study led by researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) revealed that regular tea drinkers have better organised brain regions — and this is associated with healthy cognitive function — compared to non-tea drinkers. Although more research is needed to better understand how functions like memory emerge from brain circuits, and the possible interventions to better preserve cognition during the ageing process, it is very interesting to see how studies have shown that drinking tea improve ones brain health, and longate ones life!

  20. nucleahtide

    Wow, michaelchondria! I was reading an article about the ingredients of tea and saw that most tea leaves contain proanthocyanidins, which can prevent cell damage. In addition, tea can make you feel happier due to theanine! This all contributes to the health benefits of drinking tea.

    https://www.healthstatus.com/health_blog/wellness/what-is-in-tea/

  21. jouleia

    This is super interesting! I know you mentioned that green tea is the most beneficial but I’m curious as to whether or not other specific types of teas have different levels of benefits on humans. The beginning of this article https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK92768/ references how green tea is specifically more beneficial to black tea in terms of health benefits.

  22. Yusra Azaz

    @MICHAELCHONDRIA, thank you so much for posting this article! It is truly thought provoking, and a topic I don’t often hear about. However, I wonder if the https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200109105508.http ’s research has too small a sample size, as it seems to have surveyed mainly green tea drinkers.

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