Originally published January 3 2006
Hot drinks the subjects of many new nutritional studies
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Beverages like coffee, tea and wassail are being tested in labs around the world, as food industry experts recognize the growing consumer awareness with regards to nutrition and attempt to capitalize on it.
This holiday season Americans will drink a lot more cocoa, tea and coffee.
New research shows these popular drinks not only warm the body but could heat up the immune system and possibly prevent certain ailments.
The key is their high levels of antioxidants, which help counteract the damaging effect that oxygen can have on the body's tissues.
Oxygen is important to basic cell function, but inside tissues, it strips electrons from molecules, leaving behind "free radicals" which are part of the chemistry that causes heart disease, cancer, strokes, and other problems.
"People in general are responding to beverage products with health and wellness benefits," John Sicher of Beverage Digest told LiveScience.
Researchers at the University of Scranton found that a cup of coffee is the number one source of antioxidants in the U.S. diet.
Research led by Cornell University's Chang Yong Lee found that hot cocoa, on a per-serving basis, has four to five times more antioxidants than black tea, two to three times more than green tea, and almost two times more than red wine.
Higher levels of the compounds hippurate and glycine and lower levels of creatinine were found in subjects' urine at the end of the test.
The glycine increase showed up especially in females, suggesting the tea helped with reproductive activity, such as during early pregnancy, said study leader Elaine Holmes at Imperial College London.
The declines in creatinine could have been the result of antioxidant activity caused by the chamomile tea, Holmes and her colleagues say.
Chamomile is known to have microbe-killing capabilities.
So the authors figure increased hippurate after drinking chamomile tea was a result of disruption of disease-causing microbes in the gut.
The cocoa and chamomile research papers were published recently in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.
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