Rinsing with Green Tea Improves Oral Health

Rinse with green tea and keep your teeth happy. (Photo by Daria)

I've written before about the protective effects of green tea against dental caries. Several studies have shown that green tea helps tooth and gum health by reducing harmful bacteria, increasing enamel strength and inhibiting the breakdown of starch to sugar.

Black tea, cocoa and coffee protect against oral problems too, but green tea seems to be the most effective. A new study sheds more light on how drinking green tea improve oral defense mechanisms through oral peroxidases (OPOs) (link).

The two major defensive peroxidases of the mouth are salivary peroxidase (SPO) and myeloperoxidase (MPO). Their function depends partly on diet and probably also on genes.
In the abstract of the paper, the authors mention that their earlier study showed that elderly people who drank green tea for 3 months had higher levels of oral peroxidase activity than non-drinkers. In this study, they compared the effects of green tea on OPO in vivo and in vitro.

Adding a green tea infusion to saliva increased oral peroxidase activity by 280%, while black tea increased it by only 54%. Adding only epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), the main polyphenol in green tea, increased activity by 42%. The effect was dose-dependent, which I assume here means that the stronger the tea, the greater the effect.

In human subjects, green tea gave a very similar result. Mouth rinsing with a green tea infusion resulted in a 268% increase in OPO activity. Thus, while green tea extracts may be more useful than just drinking regular green tea for some purposes, for dental health drinking and/or rinsing is probably the most effective way.

Note, however, that higher levels of salivary peroxidase don't necessarily mean better oral health; in fact, people with more dental caries and gingivitis tend to have higher SPO activity (link). My guess is that this is a defense mechanism against the harmful effects of excess hydrogen peroxide, which is excreted by oral bacteria. In other words, the stronger the attack, the stronger the defense.

In the case of green tea it seems that increasing SPO really does lead to better oral health, though.

For more information on green tea and dental health, see these posts:

Drinking 10 Cups of Green Tea Daily and Not Smoking Could Add 12 Years to Your Life
Green Tea Extract Enhances Abdominal Fat Loss from Exercise
Vegetable vs. Animal Sources of Vitamin A: Why Eating Carrots Isn't Enough
Genes, Diet and Oral Health: Why Do Some People Get Cavities and Others Don't?

Picture of an Ally

As I walked across campus today I noticed a large multicolored tent with a door in front of the Russell House, the student union. I then saw someone come through the door, or I should say, out of the door. He was carrying a large sign that said, "Gay!" What a wonderful way to celebrate National Coming Out Day.

When I got a bit closer to the event a young student approached me and said, "Would you like to come out as an ally?"

"You bet!"

I think he was a bit surprised by my quick reply. I wasn't. I know where I stand; I wrote last year about being an ally (and the year before too). A student from my program was at the event and snapped a picture of me as I came out in support of equal rights.

Happy National Coming Out Day!

Photo by Lizzie Dement

Anti-Aging in the Media: BBC on Calorie Restriction & Intermittent Fasting

Most of the recent documentaries and newspaper pieces on calorie restriction haven't really offered anything new. They pretty much just repeat the same old arguments about mice eating less and living longer, and then joke that starving yourself will at least make your life seem longer.

This recent BBC Horizon documentary was a positive surprise, however. It does a pretty good job of covering both traditional calorie restriction (CR) and various forms of intermittent fasting (IF), and while the scientists are overly optimistic about either strategy extending maximum lifespan in humans, they do make some good points.

There's for example Luigi Fontana, something of a celebrity in the CR research field, who thinks practicioners of calorie restriction are so much healthier than the average person that they almost "belong to another species". Right. The host of the show correctly points out that Joseph Cordell, the decade-long CR practitioner he interviews, doesn't look remarkably younger than the average 50-year-old.

His blood tests do indicate a very good health, however, and what's interesting is that Cordell is not severely calorie-restricted – he eats 1,900 kcal per day. For an average male, I think that's entirely doable, as long as you pay attention to the nutritional value of the diet to avoid hunger. Cordell also doesn't have that "cancer patient" look to him that a lot of CR skeptics worry about; he's thin but not overly so.

Several of the scientists and professors in the documentary seem to think that intermittent fasting is as good as calorie restriction for longevity, even though the evidence shows otherwise: in animals, IF results in increased lifespan only to the degree that it also results in CR. One of the researchers advocates a diet of fasting and feasting every other day, but not in the traditional 24-hour cycles. Instead, she recommends eating around 400-600 kcal on the fast days and as much as you like on the feast days.

In my experience, at least the 24-hour cycle of fasting and feasting (where you're not allowed any calories during the fast) results in eating twice as much during feast days, unless you purposefully count and restrict calories during feast days as well. She says that there is a calorie deficit, however: during fast days, you're allowed around 25% of your normal calorie intake, and during feasting days you naturally end up eating around 110% of your normal intake. This sounds very strange to me, as it would mean an easy way of accomplishing rather severe CR. I am intrigued by this semi-fasting approach, though.

Another form of IF tried in the documentary is alternate-day feeding based on weekdays instead of 24-hour cycles, i.e. you eat on Monday and then don't eat on Tuesday etc. This is much more difficult than IF based on a 24-hour cycle, since you're essentially fasting around 32 hours at a time. Then there's the 5/2 approach, where you eat for 5 days and then fast for 2 days. And the "4 days of fasting every few months" approach. In the IF circles, there's still debate over which approach is best. Last time I looked, nobody knew the answer to how many hours of fasting is needed to produce the best benefits in humans.

A point that keeps coming up in the documentary is the effect of IGF-1 on aging and the effect of fasting and/or calorie restriction on IGF-1. As Fontana's research suggests, lowering IGF-1 may be crucial for any lifespan extension effects of CR. The 4-day fast clearly lowers IGF-1, but the effect doesn't last long. Cordell's IGF-1 levels are not shown, but since his blood parameters are those of a young man, I assume his IGF-1 is lower than average; probably due to a combination of slight CR and protein restriction.

If you ignore the unrealistic expectations of extending maximum lifespan in humans, the results are overall pretty optimistic. It seems that even a slight reduction in calories and fasting every now and then might significantly improve your health parameters.

Put another way, IF and CR might not make humans live to 120, but they might make you live to 100 without dying of the usual killers like cancer and heart disease. I haven't heard of Joseph Cordell before and am not familiar with how all of his biomarkers look like, but if it is true that he eats 1,900 kcal per day and has only been doing CR since his 40's, perhaps I've underestimated some of the potential benefits of eating only slightly less. Personally, I haven't been doing intermittent fasting for a couple of years now, but I guess it's time to read up on the latest studies and see what's happening out there.

For more information on calorie restriction and intermittent fasting, see these posts:

Antioxidants and Intermittent Fasting – Good For Longevity?
How to Deal With the 5 Most Common Difficulties of Fasting
Alternate-Day Feeding and Weight Loss: Is It the Calories Or the Fasting?
Anti-Aging in the Media: New York Times on Caloric Restriction and Resveratrol

Hey Barack, Long time, No see

Dear President Obama,

Long time, no see. The door is always open here in the Palmetto State and we've always got a fresh pitcher of sweet tea ready. But you don't come around no more. In fact, you haven't been here since January 26, 2008 when you won South Carolina's primary.

Happy to see Obama inaugurated?
(Or to have a snow day?)

Remember me? OK, probably not, but a week before that primary I saw you at the Columbia Convention Center on the eve of Martin Luther King Day. I hoisted my three-year old daughter onto my shoulders so she could see you. My six-year old son stood on his tippy-toes so he could catch a glimpse. Every time they heard your name on the radio or TV for months after that they would exclaim, "Hey, Daddy, they're talking about Barack Obama!" A year later, on your Inauguration Day we happened to have a rare snow storm here and so I got to stay home with the kids to watch the events of the day. Jacob estimated there must be "like 7,000 people there or something!"

So this week you'll be in Charlotte, North Carolina at the Democratic National Convention. Do you know how close that is to South Carolina? Pretty darn close. Like, as in, we have an amusement park that is in both Charlotte, North Carolina and in Fort Mill, South Carolina. 

So, while you're in the neighborhood, stop by. We'd love to see you here. Some think that traditionally red states like South Carolina are a "lost cause," but others, even Republicans (including Karl Rove), think that you could win here. Do you think you could? Is there even a hint of a 50-state strategy this time around?

Friendship Nine Lunch Counter

Get this fun fact: More than 385,000 registered black voters—and more than 168,000 unregistered voters for a grand total or more than a half million black voters—didn't show up to the polls in the 2010 election. In 2008 you lost South Carolina by 172,447 votes in the general election and it is estimated that nearly 400,000 black citizens did not vote.

And get this other fun fact: Mitt Romney enjoys a 0% approval rating among black voters.

Just sayin'.

Some think that black voters in South Carolina are essentially forfeiting races by not showing up. And you may have heard we've got a little Voter ID law debacle going on right now, too. Good times.

So, if you stop by, I've got a perfect place for you to stop in for a burger and some sweet tea: The lunch counter where the Friendship Nine did their sit-in protest in Rock Hill in 1961, a crucial event in the Civil Rights Movement here in South Carolina.

I was in Rock Hill several weeks ago and ate there. The food is delicious. And it's just a hop over the border from Charlotte. You could zip down, have a burger, a photo-op (maybe even with some of the Friendship Nine; I met a few of them at a premier of the documentary about them, "Jail, No Bail"), and be back to Charlotte in no time. 

Could South Carolina get an hour or two of your time while you're next door?

Just some food for thought. 

Sincerely, 

The Palmetto State

Våldtäktsepidemi

Våldtäkterna ökar. Vän av ordning undrar onekligen vad det är som händer? Jag har fyra döttrar. Man kan säga att jag tycker att den här problematiken är oroande, mycket oroande. Enligt internationell statistik ligger Sverige i topp i våldtäktsligan, endast slagen av Lesotho.

Enligt gällande doktrin så beror det på en ökad anmälningsbenägenhet (?). Förmodligen är det samma orsak till att Lesotho hamnat i topp. Precis som svenska kvinnor har de Lesothiska kvinnorna plötsligt slutat acceptera att bli våldtagna och därför anmäler de fler övergrepp helt enkelt. Så egentligen har ingenting förändrats eftersom det enligt polisen finns ett stort mörkertal.

Vilket betyder att det sker ännu fler våldtäkter än vad som visas i statistiken, och detta framhålls som ett lugnande faktum! Ibland undrar man hur människor tänker egentligen.

Jag minns på 80-talet när det begav sig, då var det en och annan våldtäkt som skedde, men då var det på allas läppar. Men nu har det skett en attitydförändring, fem våldtäkter om dagen bara i Stockholm och ingen höjer på ögonbrynen.

Ökad anmälningsbenägenhet är inte förklaringen på problemet. Det är anmälningarna som är vår indikator och gör oss uppmärksamma på problemet! Det är mycket obehagligt det som händer just nu. Som far till fyra döttrar är jag både besviken och orolig över att ingen verkar bry sig nämnvärt.