Drink Tea to Lower Your Cholesterol

Before starting to find out the benefits of tea on cholesterol, here is a recap to find out how cholesterol enters the center of heart diseases.The heart and the brain in our bodies need constant supply of blood to function normally. The coronary artery provides fresh blood (blood that contains oxygen) to the heart. The brain also has its food supplying arteries. The major cause of heart attack or stroke is the blockage those main arteries that bring nutrients and oxygen to the heart and the brain, respectively.

What forms those deadly blockages?

Those harmful blockages are plaques that form along the arteries' walls. They are made of cholesterol in the blood.
The size and number of this dangerous plaque can increase with age, usage of tobacco, exposure to stress, high consumption of alcohol, and lack of regular exercise...

Many studies have found the relationship between high cholesterol and increasing risk of heart attacks and strokes. Physicians began to pay more attention to cholesterol in patients with heart diseases. Cholesterol is not a bad substance in our body. Actually, it is needed for the body to perform certain important functions such as transportation of vitamin A in the blood, producing sexual hormones, and creating vitamin D...

It is found that about 80& of cholesterol is produced by the liver in the body. 20 % comes from consuming high-fat diet. After years of observing the function of cholesterol in the body, scientists have found its accomplice that causes the heart attack: LDL .LDL stands for low density lipoprotein. This substance is easily frozen at low temperature, thus the name--low density.

LDL has the ability to transport large amount of cholesterol into the arteries' wall. This enlarges the plaques or forms new plaques along the walls of the arteries.When free radicals damage LDL molecules, those broken LDL can further accumulate and damage the blood vessels. Thus LDL is commonly known as the "bad" cholesterol.

Have you ever heard of HDL?

HDL stands for high density lipoprotein. It requires higher temperature in order to freeze. Due to these properties, HDL reduces the risk of developing plaques.
One important function of HDL is that HDL carries the cholesterol to the live to be processed instead of transferring them into the arteries' walls.
Therefore, a high amount of LDL increases the risk of developing heart diseases. On the other hand, high amount of HDL reduces the chance of having heart attacks.

The effect of tea on cholesterol

Tea, especially green tea, is known to contain high level of antioxidant polyphenols . Studies have shown that polyphenols in tea can prevent the cholesterol from entering the body.An abundant polyphenol tea, specifically flavonoids and EGCG molecules, have the ability to change the chemical properties of cholesterol.

These cholesterol molecules are no longer recognized as nutrients. They are excreted out of the body as waste. The effects of tea on cholesterol have been proven by looking at different population around the globe.For example, the Japanese have significantly lower rate of death due to heart attack than Americans.
Although most of Japanese men are smokers, their daily intake of tea has drastically reduced their risks of forming dangerous plaques. Thus the important effect of tea on cholesterol is to lower the rate of heart attacks and death from heart diseases.