131,401 people, aged between 18 to 95, were studied by Professor Nicolas Danchin’s team between January 2001 and December 2008 at the Paris IPC Preventive Medicine Center. That’s a big study! The study found that people who drank tea reduced the risk of cardiovascular disease by 24%.
The team investigated the effects of coffee and tea on CV mortality and non-CV mortality in a large French population at low risk of cardiovascular diseases.
Cardiovascular (CV) health has a great impact on brain health. Most experts say, ‘think brain, think heart’ health. So, extrapolating that thought, could the good old British cuppa help ward off dementia?
Men were more likely to drink coffee than tea, and women more likely to drink tea than coffee. The tea drinkers had a better CV profile than the coffee drinkers. And their blood pressure was better, too.
Professor Danchin said: ‘Tea has antioxidants which may provide survival benefits. Tea drinkers also have healthier lifestyles; so does tea drinking reflect a particular person profile or is it tea, per se, that improves outcomes – for me that remains an open question. Pending the answer to that question, I think that you could fairly honestly recommend tea drinking rather than coffee drinking and even rather than not drinking anything at all.’
Does this mean that tea is more than ‘the cup that cheers’? Or is it just one of those little things that help?
Read the European Society of Cardiology’s report on their website: http://www.escardio.org/about/press/press-releases/esc14-barcelona/Pages/coffee-tea-ipc-cohort.aspx
