1. Fight a UTI
Drinking 2 to 3 cups of green tea daily can help clear up a urinary tract infection. The tea contains antioxidants that one study found can reduce bladder inflammation. Other studies have shown that green tea drinkers have a 40 percent lower incidence of UTIs than those who did not drink green tea.
2.Relieve allergies
Green tea is rich in flavonoids, plant chemicals that protect against inflammation. For struggles with allergies, try drinking a few cups of tea a day and see if the sinus inflammation goes down.
3.Reduce puffy eyes
Some herbalists claim that tea bag compresses speed the healing of a black eye, but to calm puffy tissues, take two wet green tea bags, place them on tired or swollen eyes, and lie down for 15 to 20 minutes as the tea soothes and refreshes.
4.Reduce asthma symptoms
The antioxidant quercetin, found in green tea, has been shown to inhibit the release of inflammatory substances from mast cells, which are involved in allergic responses. (This is how some asthma drugs work.) Try drinking two cups of green tea day to keep asthma symptoms at bay.
5.Cut down on stress
Green tea is lower in caffeine than most other teas, so you may be able to drink the five cups a day that lowered psychological stress in a large group of Japanese people in a recent study done at Sendai’s Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine. The researchers didn’t identify any particular component of green tea that might have been soothing, but animal studies suggest that one compound, EGCC, had both sedative and hypnotic effects that tamp down the body’s production of stress chemicals.
green tea iStock/Thinkstock
6. Provide off-the-charts levels of antioxidants
Scientists at Tufts University compared the "ORAC" (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity, a measurement of the total antioxidant power of foods and other chemical substances) of black and green tea and 22 fruits and vegetables, and found green tea brewed for five minutes outranked even so-called superfoods on the produce list. And EGCC, a catechin found in tea (and shows highest levels in green tea) has been shown to protect the DNA in cells from cancer-inducing changes. Antioxidants are essential for neutralizing and removing free radicals found in the bloodstream that can damage cells and cause disease. This antioxidant ability may be why green tea is believed to play a role in cancer prevention.
