I'm often asked my opinion about the cause or treatment of some medical condition,

but the question to instead ask is, what does the science say?

What is the best available balance of evidence published in the peer-reviewed medical literature

you have to say right now?

Welcome to the Nutrition Facts podcast.

I'm your host, Dr. Michael Greger.

Today we look at why the tea plant has a singular effect on our brain and body.

Tea, whether white tea, green tea, oolong, or black, are all made from the tea plant,

chameleus senances.

That's different from herbal tea, which is defined as pouring hot water over any plant in the

world other than this particular plant.

There are at least 287,655 different plants that we know of on this planet.

Why is this one plant the most popular

beverage in the world?

It's not the caffeine, or the coffee plant is more caffeine, but more people drink tea than

coffee.

It's probably not the taste.

I mean, most people would probably prefer peppermint or some of the fruity berry tea to be better tasting.

I mean, it's a pretty enough plant, but why do we drink literally billions of cups a day

of this particular plant?

It turns out there's something in this plant that's found concentrated in only two places

in nature in the tea plant and and an odd mushroom called a bay

...