Six Dangers of Drinking Tea. Have You Fallen into These Traps?

Yesterday a colleague of mine was at work and suddenly had severe lower back pain. He took the day off and texted me in the evening that he had a kidney stone.

When I heard that, I immediately thought of tea.

It turned out to be that, in the later conversation with the doctor, he said it was caused by uric acid levels because of consuming too many high-purine foods such as milk, bean products, seafood, beer and tea, and combined with his job of sitting for a long time every day.

So should tea be responsible for this? What are some of the daily dangers of drinking tea?

Don't wash tea set.

I once saw a man whose tea cup had an awful thick layer of tea residue. I asked him why he didn't wash the cup and how there was so much dirt on it?

He said: "This is my tea mountain, and it's our culture."

The tea dregs are primarily the residues of the tannins in the teacups, but old tea dregs can produce toxic heavy metals like cadmium, lead, mercury and arsenic.

So every day's teacup still need to be washed, and as for purple sand teapot is said to care for the teapot, it also needs daily cleaning, rather than not washing.

Drinking scalding tea

My friend from Guangdong is really impulsive. He gulps down the hot tea as soon as it's poured. As someone who drinks a lot of tea, I find even mine too hot to swallow.

Besides our mouth, another part which can get close to the scalding tea is the oesophagus. The epithelial lining of the oesophagus on its outer side can only tolerate a temperature of 50~60℃. If it exceeds this temperature, the epithelium of the oesophagus will be burnt.

So we don't drink tea that's too hot when drinking tea normally. We usually brew the tea well and then wait for two or three minutes before drinking, using those two or three minutes to smell the fragrance, observe the color of the tea liquid, and sense the transformation of different levels of tea liquids.

Drinking cold tea

Here you need to distinguish between iced tea and cold-brewed tea.

"Cooled tea" refers only to tea that is not drank for a long time after it has been steeped in boiling water.

When the tea is cooled down, the polyphenols and vitamins in the tea liquid will oxidize and decrease in content. Additionally, being exposed to air may breed spoilage microorganisms making the tea taste bad.

One key point is that a national research study has shown that tea leaves contain large amounts of oxalic acid after being cooled, which can form small stones.

Cold-brew tea research currently has no such concerns, but you don't want to steep it for too long either.

Having tea to sober up

This saying was especially popular when I was young, and if my dad drank too much wine, there were two ways to solve the problem: one was to drink vinegar, and another was to drink tea.

However, the reality is that drinking tea can help sober you up, but it's a misconception.

Drinking tea appears to wake people up only because of caffeine's effect.

Catechins in tea have a diuretic effect. But when the body takes alcohol, alcohol is converted into acetaldehyde in the body and when it has not been completely decomposed, it will make the diuretic effect of catechins in tea enter into the kidney of the human body.

Drinking tea itself can lead to excessive excitement and caffeine in the tea leaves will stimulate the nervous system, thus easily putting extra pressure on the heart.

So drinking tea after alcohol is not a good idea, but it's true to drink some warm water or milk before drinking. That way your stomach will be protected.

Drinking tea on an empty stomach

Some people often experience nervousness after drinking tea and most of the time it's because they drank it on an empty stomach.

Tea nature is cold by nature, so drinking tea can easily damage the stomach, especially those with stronger tea flavor.

So in daily life, we should drink tea that is lightly brewed, according to one's body condition, and avoid drinking on an empty stomach.

Excessive tea consumption

Too little tea is not refreshing; too much of it can lead to overstimulation.

In normal circumstances, a healthy adult can drink 8 to 15 grams of tea per day without any problem; some people who are physically strong and have a large amount of physical activity can also increase the amount they drink without problems.

But you should note that if a food is regularly consumed over time, it may need to be associated with tea drinking.

For example: Drink a lot of milk every day and consume less tea because they are both high-purine foods.