Green Tea and Cholesterol

If you enjoy green tea, you may be able to get a modest cholesterol-lowering benefit from your habit. But don’t expect it to take the place of a statin or other doctor-prescribed treatment.

 Last year, a report in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition analyzed data from 14 studies on the effects of green tea on cholesterol. What they found was, compared with people who took placebos, those who drank green tea daily for several months saw their total and “lousy” LDL cholesterol fall. The green tea drinkers registered total cholesterol levels 7.2 mg/dL lower and LDL levels 2.2 mg/dL lower than when they started. While that’s not a huge improvement, every little bit can help. The researchers speculate that the cholesterol-lowering benefit may come from chemicals known as catechins, which decrease the absorption of cholesterol in the gut.
To boost the amount of catechins your body can use, you might want to add lemon juice to your mug. A separate study on tea found that squeezing the citrus into your brew helps preserve more of these compounds as they make their way through your digestive tract.