“It can avoid treatment for a few years”: how tea reduces your blood pressure and improves your heart health

The French consume an average of 250 grams of tea per person per year, according to figures from the Chambers of Agriculture of France. And they’re not the only ones. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, per capita tea consumption globally has increased by about 2.1 percent per year over the past decade. This makes it, after water, the second most consumed drink in the world. A positive news as the virtues of this ancestral drink are numerous. Antioxidant and anti-inflammatory action, prevention of certain diseases including cancer, arthritis and obesity… “Tea is at the origin of a procession of small actions that all go in the same direction: that of good cardiovascular and general health,” comments Dr. Anne-Laure Laprérie, cardiologist and president of the Commission coeur des femmes of the French Federation of Cardiology.

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Antioxidant and relaxing

The health benefits of the drink are mainly attributable to polyphenols in tea tree leaves, grown in Southeast Asia, and more specifically to catechins. “Thanks to its antioxidant action, tea will act on LDL cholesterol (which is also known as bad cholesterol, editor’s note), and more precisely decrease it by preventing it from oxidizing, says Dr. Laprérie. We then avoid the fouling of the arteries, which itself comes from an excess of cholesterol oxidation. Ultimately, an accumulation of this bad cholesterol can “increase the risk of atherosclerosis, an impairment of the lining of the vessels of the arteries that increases the risk of stroke and can promote infarction,” said nutritionist Corinne Chicheportiche-Ayache in a previous article.

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Tea also has an effect on blood pressure. It acts on a protein located in the wall of the arteries and has a relaxing effect by dilating the blood vessels. Result? A drop in blood pressure, which, when too high, increases the risk of several cardiovascular diseases including stroke, heart attack or heart failure.

What is the best tea?

Is one type of tea better than another? “In theory, green tea is a little bit higher in terms of heart health benefits,” says Dr. Laprérie. Because if all the teas come from the same plant, each manufacturing process will slightly modify the composition into polyphenols. For example, green tea is obtained by removing the water present in the leaves and freezing them: this process allows to preserve largely the catechins, rich in antioxidants. “And this type of tea containing more catechins than black tea, so it theoretically has more effects on blood pressure, informs the cardiologist. However, the polyphenols in black tea have, in fact, an equally positive impact.

Not medical treatment

But be careful not to see in the drink a treatment. “Its consumption can be interesting in the case of a normal tension, a little high, just at the limit, warns Dr. Laprérie. And combined with a decrease in alcohol consumption, a healthy diet and an increase in physical activity, it can avoid treatment for a few years.” But in case of more severe high blood pressure, the doctor insists: you should consult a specialist and follow a treatment, to which – of course – we can add a regular consumption of tea.

The cardiologist also recommends to take care of the origin of her tea. “We must pay attention to the side effects related to the pesticides contained in certain bags but also to the presence of microplastics in their composition, on which had been alerted to the National Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health Safety (ANSES) in 2022,” she recalls. For tenfold benefits, we therefore prefer tea in bulk and we take care of its provenance.

Finally, we stick to a reasoned daily consumption, without exceeding 4 to 5 mugs (cups of 25 cl) of tea. Or, “400 mg of tea throughout the day, with a teaspoon of tea in each of the cups,” said Bernard Srour, a researcher at the National Research Institute for Agriculture (INRAE), citing the recommendations of ANSES.