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Tea and The Immune System
When your body's natural immune system is weak, it leaves you open to become
sick more often. People with Diabetes and HIV, for instance, have weakened
immune systems and they're much more susceptible to catching colds, getting
the flu, or developing more severe sicknesses and illnesses. Research shows
that both black and green tea can help with strengthening the body's immune
system by increasing the amount of gamma delta T cells which help
the body fight off infections, illness and various types of disease.
Tea seems to have wonderful health benefits on the body's immune system
functionality. Both green and black tea offer this benefit, but a specific
substance in Black tea has made some researchers fairly excited. The
substance is known as L-theanine, which works to prepare the body's immune
system to fight off bacteria, infections, fungus and viruses.
Essentially, this substance seems to work similarly to the way vaccines work:
It exposes your body to something bad, so that your body can respond by
creating it's own immunity to it.
In the study where researchers identified L-theanine, human participants drank
Black tea five times a day for two to four weeks. After this time, they were
shown to secrete as much as four times the average amount of
interferon from their bodies, which is a critical part of the body's natural
immune system defense. The study also tested participants drinking coffee in
the same amounts for the same amount of time, and those results showed no
changes in the interferon secretion levels of the body.
In general, previous tests have shown tea to literally wipe out or neutralize
germs, including those that cause sicknesses such as skin infections,
pneumonia and diarrhea. Some research has even shown both black and green tea
to get rid of other viruses such as herpes and possibly even the flu.
One Japanese study showed that just gargling with black tea actually made the
body's immunity to flu stronger, while yet another study suggests that the
ECGC in Green tea could even help reduce the risks of becoming infected with
the HIV virus.
So, if you find yourself constantly coming down with the latest cold or virus,
or you already have Diabetes, drinking green or black tea may prove to be
quite beneficial for you over time.
http://www.teausa.com/general/218g.cfm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_benefits_of_tea
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