Your daily cup of tea might do more than help you relax — it could also help remove harmful heavy metals from your drinking water, new research suggests. A Northwestern University study found that tea leaves can naturally pull lead and other dangerous metals out of water as tea steeps. About 5 billion cups of tea are consumed each day worldwide, according to one estimate. “You can see the implications,” said Vinayak Dravid, a materials scientist at Northwestern and an author of the study. “How often do we touch billions of people?” Heavy metal contamination — especially lead — is a growing concern, especially in areas with aging pipes. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that about 9 million U.S. homes get their water through pipes that contain lead, The New York Times reported. Those pipes can allow the toxic metal to leach into drinking water. Even small amounts of lead exposure can be dangerous, especially for children, potentially leading to developmental delays and behavioral problems. In the study, David and his team tested a variety of teas — including black, white, oolong, green, rooibos, herbal, loose leaf and plain Lipton — to see how well they absorbed lead from water during various steeping times. The researchers found that black tea was the most effective at pulling lead from water. “Green tea and black…  read on >  read on >

It’s a cook’s maxim that everything’s better with butter. Except your health, a new study suggests. People who eat loads of butter have a higher risk of premature death, while those who use mostly plant-based oils like canola or olive oil have a lower-than-average risk, researchers found. What’s more, swapping butter out for plant-based oils like canola or olive oil causes a person’s risk of premature death to drop dramatically, researchers reported in JAMA Internal Medicine. Substituting 10 grams of butter a day — less than a tablespoon — with plant-based oils could lower by 17% a person’s risk of death from any reason and from cancer specifically, results show. “What’s surprising is the magnitude of the association that we found — we saw a 17% lower risk of death when we modeled swapping butter with plant-based oils in daily diet. That is a pretty huge effect on health,” lead investigator Yu Zhang, a research assistant at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, said in a news release. The findings are based on diet and health data from more than 220,000 people followed for more than three decades as part of three long-term studies of health professionals. Every four years, participants answered questions about their diets. Total butter intake included butter and margarine blends, spreadable butter and butter used for baking and frying at home.…  read on >  read on >

Breastfeeding can promote lower blood pressure among children, a new study says. Longer-term breastfeeding appears to populate a baby’s gut with diverse bacteria that could help lower blood pressure, researchers found. Children who were breastfed for at least six months had lower blood pressure at age 6, researchers report in the Journal of the American Heart Association. “Our findings suggest a potential significance of early-life gut microbiota on cardiovascular health in early childhood,” concluded the research team led by senior investigator Noel Mueller, an associate professor of epidemiology with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. For the study, researchers reviewed data on 526 children enrolled in a Danish study of childhood asthma. As part of the study, stool samples were collected from each child at 1 week, 1 month and 1 year of age. These samples were analyzed to determine the content of their gut bacteria. The study also checked the children’s blood pressure at 3 and 6 years of age. Researchers found that children with more diverse gut bacteria at 1 month had lower blood pressure at age 6. The blood pressure-lowering effect of diverse gut bacteria was further amplified among children who were breastfed for at least six months, results show. Children with highly diverse gut bacteria had systolic blood pressure about two points lower than average at age 6 if they…  read on >  read on >

More than a third of food-allergic kids were able to eat full servings of their trigger foods after treatment with an injectable asthma drug, new clinical trial findings report. In all, 36% of children treated with omalizumab (Xolair) for a year successfully ate full servings of allergy-triggering foods, according to phase 2 trial results presented Sunday at a meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology in San Diego. By comparison, only 19% of children could do the same when given a shorter round of omalizumab followed by months of oral immunotherapy, a treatment through which patients build tolerance by eating gradually increasing amounts of food allergens. Further, early stage 3 results from the clinical trial found that children retained some resistance to food allergies even after they stopped taking omalizumab, researchers reported. “This is the first time we’ve been able to directly compare these two treatments for multiple food allergies, and our study shows omalizumab was superior to oral immunotherapy,” principal investigator Dr. Robert Wood, director of the Eudowood Division of Allergy, Immunology and Rheumatology at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, said in a news release. Food allergies are common, affecting 8% of U.S. children and 10% of adults, researchers said in background notes. Omalizumab works by binding to the antibodies that promote allergic reactions, rendering them inactive, researchers said in background notes.…  read on >  read on >

A diet rich in fish might slow the progression of multiple sclerosis in some patients, a new study says. The nutrients found in fish can quell inflammation and protect brain cells, and this might be of particular benefit for MS patients, researchers reported in the Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery & Psychiatry. MS patients who ate larger amounts of lean or oily fish had a 34% lower risk of their symptoms growing worse, researchers found. They also had about a 45% lower risk of scoring worse on a scale that measures MS disability, the results show. “The results underscore the potential role of diet, particularly fish consumption, as a modifiable factor that could complement existing therapeutic strategies for MS,” concluded a team led by Anna Karin Hedström, a senior research specialist with the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. MS occurs when a person’s immune system attacks myelin, the protective sheath that coats nerve fibers. The damage to nerve cells causes the brain to shrink as well as symptoms like muscle weakness, stiffness, spasms, vision problems, thinking declines and pain. For the study, researchers analyzed data for more than 2,700 Swedish MS patients who participated in a nationwide study between April 2005 and June 2015. Upon entering the study, participants reported on many of their lifestyle habits, including their consumption of fish. Results showed that people who…  read on >  read on >

Turns out, Americans may be drinking less coffee, soda and tea, but they’re getting more caffeine than ever. A new study of more than 49,000 U.S. adults found that while fewer are sipping caffeinated drinks, those who do are choosing much stronger doses, with coffee taking the lead. The result? Caffeine intake is rising, even though the average consumption is still below 400 milligrams of caffeine per day. That’s the amount health experts consider safe. “We are all aware that the caffeinated beverage market has changed dramatically over the past 10 years, yet no comparable, comprehensive caffeine intake data have been published in recent years,” study author Diane Mitchell of the Institute for Advancing Health through Agriculture, Texas A&M AgriLife, said in a news release. Coffee now accounts for 70% of total caffeine consumption, up 15% from the previous 2010-2011 survey, Mitchell’s team reported. What’s more, carbonated soft drinks now contribute only 15% of caffeine intake, a 27% decrease from a decade ago. Tea consumption has also dropped significantly, with 50% fewer tea drinkers overall. However, the remaining tea drinkers nearly doubled their caffeine intake from tea, suggesting those who stuck with the beverage are, in fact, drinking more. Energy drinks, which were less common a decade ago, now account for 6% of total caffeine intake, as the number of available brands has jumped from…  read on >  read on >

The health benefits of aggressive blood pressure control outweigh the potential risks for seniors, according to the latest results from a major clinical trial. About 85% of seniors treated to a target blood pressure of 120 systolic (the top number in a blood pressure reading) had a positive net benefit from such tight control, researchers reported. The reduced risk of heart disease and early death outweighed the negatives that can accompany such aggressive treatment, which include potential kidney damage or dangerously low blood pressure, results show. “Almost all … participants aged 65 years or greater had a predicted net benefit that favored an systolic blood pressure target of less than 120 mm Hg over a systolic blood pressure target of less than 140 mm Hg,” concluded the research team led by senior investigator Dr. Simon Ascher, an assistant clinical professor with the University of California-Davis. Systolic blood pressure refers to pressure within blood vessels during a heartbeat. Elderly patients, frail seniors and those taking many different medications derived “greater absolute harms from intensive blood pressure lowering,” along with greater heart disease, cognitive and death rate benefits, the study found.  These results come from the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT), which in 2017 led major U.S. cardiology groups to revise their definition of high blood pressure. As a result, blood pressure of 130 systolic has…  read on >  read on >