Black tea might result in a lower risk of diabetes, as a new study in the journal BMJ Open shows.
In the study, researchers from Data Mining International in Switzerland found an interesting and important fact that most people in countries fond of black tea-drinking have relatively lower rates of diabetes and some disease caused by diabetes.
The study analyzed the data on black tea consumption and disease rates coming from 50 countries that were in the World Health Survey in 2009. The researchers wanted to investigate the potential diseases that were linked to black tea consumption. They had looked at diseases including diabetes, heart disease, cancer, respiratory disease and infectious disease.
Researchers noticed that in countries where a large proportion of people love drinking black tea-- like Ireland, where nearly an average of 4.4 pounds of black tea are consumed by each person every year, the same situations in Turkey and United Kingdom -- the prevalence of diabetes are at the lowest levels, compared to other countries.
In addition, in some countries like Mexico, Morocco, Brazil, China and South Korea, people drank the less amount of black tea in the study. All of these countries also have the relatively low levels of prevalence of diabetes. As a Chinese, I know clearly that plenty of people across my country are fond of drinking black tea. Many people around me are a little "addicted" to black tea. Of course, the majority of them have normal sugar levels and slim figures all their lifetime.
Some people may argue that it may be too early to say that black tea could actually have protective effect against diabetes. It seems to them that such a conclusion just doesn't make sense for some caveats existed in the new study:
For instance, the quality and consistency of record keeping among the 50 countries analyzed may vary, while it is common sense that results at the population level may not be true at the individual level.
The above caveats are reasonable to some extent, but "the findings are consistent with previous studies that have also suggested a link," study researchers emphasized. On the other hand, researchers failed to find an association between other diseases and black tea consumption.
Obviously, this is not the first time that tea-drinking has been linked with health benefits. So why not consider increasing your black tea consumption for better health?
About the Author
Peizhou Liao is 1st-year PhD student in Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Emory University. He has much passion for the applications of statistical theories and methods on biological sciences.
Hi Peizhou,
ReplyDeleteNice job, this is an interesting and informative posting. Fond of black tea myself (my favorite is Earl Grey), I was delighted to find out that it may help to prevent diabetes! I also liked the language of the post, it was not heavy with scientific terms. And the recommendation was indeed clear and easy to implement!
I would suggest some adjustments to make it even more interesting and reader-friendly. First, you may want to change the picture of what I think are unfermented tea leaves, with some appetizing cup of tea. Second, it was a bit unclear from the text if relationship between tea consumption and diabetes in Mexico, Morocco, Brazil, China and South Korea was a direct or inverse one. Difference between population and individual-level results may be a common sense for a public health professional, but not necessarily for the lay person. Finally, you may insert a link to some websites describing this and other health benefits of black tea, I am sure there are many of them.
Great blog post! You did a good job of explaining the study, what the results were, and what the limitations were (without getting too technical). One thing I was wondering was: what about green tea? The countries in east and southeast Asia traditionally associated with green tea consumption tend to have lower prevalence of diabetes, and green tea has been linked to numerous health benefits. I'm sure some people would be interested in why green tea was excluded from this study, and if there are similar studies including green tea.
ReplyDeleteHi Peizhou,
ReplyDeleteInteresting post! I keep reading about the benefits of tea and have been curious about it. I personally like my tea with lots of sugar, so I'm not sure if that would counteract any of the benefits you mention. : )
I think the overall tone of your post is really good -- I like how you make it personal and bring your own perspective into it.
I agree with Umed about his suggestions to make it even more accessible and attention-grabbing to the average person. Some other thoughts I have would be to change up the title and opening sentence to not specifically reference a research study.
I think this is a potentially challenging study because you have to be clear that it's association and not causation. You do a good job of explaining the association, but I could definitely see a newspaper potentially making that mistake if they picked up on the findings of the study and wanted to publicize it.
Thanks!
Very interesting blog, I always like hearing about these sorts of studies, e.g. health benefits of chocolate, wine, tea, coffee, etc. I think the general public tends to be very skeptical of this kind of research, probably because there tend to be inconsistent results across studies.
ReplyDeleteNice job summarizing the results in your blog.
Hi Piezhou,
ReplyDeleteVery nice work summarizing an interesting topic. I love tea too -- I keep a stash in my desk here at school in case of emergency. You make the information relevant by connecting it to yourself and your country.
Some of your readers might get confused when you start talking about data sets, and the difference between population and individual level data. As a challenge, maybe you could consider this an opportunity to explain (in a lay friendly way) just what the ecological fallacy is?
Hi Piezhou,
ReplyDeleteIt's a good thing I love black tea! Like Becca, I really liked how you connected this topic back to your personal experience. Given that diabetes prevalence varies by ethnic group, it would be great to see that addressed- certain ethnic groups will be at lower or higher risk, depending on their genetic predisposition. I would recommend adding in a short blurb addressing this, so the reader knows that you are merely reporting an association (but that the results may not be universally true).
I would also recommend adding in a catchy title and topic sentence to really draw people into your blog. This is a very interesting study, though, and I really liked how you succinctly summarized its key findings!
Laura
While this is a really well written summary, I think it comes off a bit TOO technical, especially if the point is to communicate public health research to a broad audience.
ReplyDeleteFrom an "in the know" perspective though I think it works very well.
Anderson
Nicely done!
ReplyDeleteYour post is a very clear explanation of the work Also, I appreciate how you incorporate the context of the work and some interpretation of the potential significance of the work (e.g., Some people may argue that it may be too early to say....)
I agree with Umed, that an attractive image of tea might be a nice addition.
Though it is outside the scope of the assignment, I think that additional information about why they looked at this in the first place or how other studies agree or disagree would help flesh out eh context even more.
Hi Peizhou,
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I like that you really broke it down into layman terms - such as when you said "countries that tend to love black tea" instead of talking about rates, or whatever other jargon the study may have used to quantify the tea consumption.
Great job!
Also you might consider some other general benefits of tea that people might relate with. Or putting in some details about HOW it is hypothesized that this happens. That would strengthen the argument that it does happen at the individual level.
Nice job!