New lurker

I like the idea of tea because of the philosophy associated with it; for me, that would be Taoism; but am into green tea because of a cancer scare I had in '02. Had the bladder operation removing the cancer and have been clear since, perhaps because of my change of diet. Doctors mentioned taking Saw Palmetto, but nothing about drinking green tea.

I looked up newsgroups talking about cancer diets and read about Chinese green tea. A nurse who noted my intake of vitamins and supplements commented that, yes green tea is drunk in China, and Chinese have a low rate of bladder cancer, but they also have a higher rate of stomach cancer. Doctor advised me to avoid tea with caffeine, drink herbal instead.

Long story short, I drink daily a couple large mugs of Chinese green tea, removing 80% of the caffeine with a 30 second blanch. To do this, I heat to steaming filtered water in a pan, blanch the tea, pour out the water, and pour in some pure distilled water I have heated to only about 140 degree f, steeping the leaves at least twice more. So far, I haven't invested in a tea pot or tried the caffeine-free tea bags; but I may.

Mostly, I rely on local Asian stores for my supply, but to get Dragon Well I've had to go on-line and pay the freight for 1lb bulk. After looking over the 25K-some posts archived at this NG, I deduce that the following retailers are a good bet: 1) Upton, 2) Culinary Teas, 3) SpecialTeas.

Regards, bookburn

I
Reply to
bookburn
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Did that doctor imply that caffeine was carcinogenic? That would be new to me.

Assuming you really want to remove most of the caffeine, 30 seconds won't do it. We've been over this territory countless times in this newsgroup. Please check the archives; I think you'll be persuaded.

/Lew

Reply to
Lewis Perin

Lewis Perin snipped-for-privacy@panix.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@panix2.panix.com:

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That was unwelcome news to me, too, when a member of my cancer support group said it too. However, googling provided

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"Nonetheless, more recent evidence does show a capacity for caffeine to worsen the mutagenicity of ionizing radiation and other carcinogenic agents through interference with cell cycle control [MUTATION RESEARCH 532:85-102 (2003)]"

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, a paper which did exhaustive tests on golden hamsters,seemed also to indicate that caffiene made more potent more standard carcinogens.
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, 1992, "Effects of caffeine, nicotine, ethanol and sodium selenite on pancreatic carcinogenesis in hamsters...",

A Japanese study that showed a stastically significant increase in cancer in hamsters that were injected with this toxic mix. Caffiene a cancer "enabler" for the other carciogens...

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, 1991, that states there there is inadequate evidence for the carcinogenicity of caffiene (implicitly *by itself*) in both humans and experimental animals.

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There are, as Winston Churchill said, three types of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics; and all of these studies are statistically based. Yet I'm not going to alter my tea habits based on the above, and not just because of tea's anti-cancer phenols, either. Life is just too short to worry about everything.

Ozzy

Reply to
Ozzy
[snip]

Actually, I believe this quote was originally attributed to Benjamin Disraeli.

Dean

Reply to
DPM

Fuller story:

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"Eventually all bon mots will be attributed to Winston Churchill, Mark Twain or Dorothy Parker"

- George Bernard Shaw.

Matti

Reply to
Matti Lamprhey

Hold on a minute, guys. Caffeine in moderation has been shown to inhibit cancer particularly in the colon and there are now-being-conducted studies questioning the duration and efficacy of ionizing radiation in some cases. The antioxidant qualities in green tea (where been over this so many times (see archives, this group) are unquestionable, at this point and justified in many, many studies. Stomach cancer is high in many Asian countries. Japan has a very, very high rate. In my opinion due to a sky high consumption of sodium (and possibly, high consumptions of raw fish and the heavy metals therein). I would think nicotine, ethanol and all that salt would dis-ease anything in Japan with or without tea. To be honest, we don't really know about cancer in China because so much of the medical data is unsubstantiated. I would assume levels of gastrointestinal disease is climbing, in general, due to high levels of pesticides, herbicides and additives in foods and, of course, high levels of saturated fats and sodium. Tea in sensible amounts is hardly a culprit. Shen

Reply to
Shen

Please check the archives of this group re: 30 second blanche - it is truly debatable. Shen

Reply to
Shen

stomach cancer in japan was due to high content of sodium & nitrates (they used them alot for conservation and foods), and also maybe to infection with H.Pylori. As Japan started to combat this situation, they ended up detecting in situ cancer -at a very early stage, and allowed them to treat this, and so 'lowered' their rates.

Smoking + Alcohol (especially combined) are a very potent and efficient method of getting esophageal cancer.

nicotine.../ smoking --> risk for other types as well, including bladder cancer, pancreas.

caffeine i've heard/read conflicting on pancreatic cancer.

fats --> colon cancer, and others.

high temperatures --> esophageal cancer risk.

dont know what kind of foods one eats to get ionizing radiation!!! inside the body .........

Reply to
SN

I spent about two hours looking over some of the threads and did see others mentioning the same equation for the 30 blanche. I know you can get organic, decaffeinated green tea, if you justify the expense. For me, doing the blanche is a good idea because of the pesticides and other contaminants used by processors. But I'm keeping an open mind. bb

Reply to
bookburn
[snip]

I read years ago that the high stomach cancer rate in Japan was linked to their use of talc for polishing rice; apparently talc affects the body much like asbestos.

Has this been disproven?

Dean

Reply to
DPM

"DPM" wrote in news:y_GdnZaWEtp8WhnanZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:

Now I thought that in China, stir-fried food was the culprit in the high rate of stomach cancer. BTW, I don't think any method of cooking affects the heavy metals that fish pick up from the polluted oceans, does it? It's just something that all sea-food eaters (inculding most fish) have to suffer...

Ozzy

Reply to
Ozzy

"If, perhaps, I ever am Compelled to speak an epigram I never seek to take the credit We all assume that Oscar said it." -- Dorothy Parker (really) (referring to Oscar Wilde)

Reply to
Scott Dorsey

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