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Green tea helps with liver damage

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Early sun on a tea plantation with young tea leaves reaching their early dew, sun radiating rays distance to greet new day on the plateau in Vietnam

A hepatitis infection can lead to liver cancer and cirrhosis.

Research from Germany shows that a bioactive compound in green tea, the catechin epigallocatechin-3-gallate, or EGCG, blocks Hepatitis C (HCV) from entering liver cells.

According to Sandra Ciesek, a researcher at the Hannover Medical School, “Green tea catechins such as EGCG and its derivatives epigallocatechin (EGC), epicatechingallate (ECG), and epicatechin (EC) have been shown to exhibit anti-viral and anti-oncogenic properties”.

HCV entry into liver cells seemed inhibited because EGCG stops viral attachment to the cell membranes. It also blocked HCV infection following liver transplants.

This is a significant finding. The abstract for the research study notes that Current antiviral therapy fails to clear infection in a substantial proportion of cases’.

The World Health Organisation reports that 170 million people globally suffer from Hepatitis C infection. And other research shows that about 2 per cent of the entire population of the world has HCV. In some countries the rate is now up to 20 per cent.

Ref:: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21837753

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