
Too Much Tea Causes Unusual Bone Disease - uladzislau
http://news.yahoo.com/too-much-tea-causes-unusual-bone-disease-222359924.html
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anigbrowl
Oh no! I drink a lot of tea...

 _47 year old woman...drank a pitcher of tea made from at least 100 tea bags
daily, for 17 years_

Whew, not even close. Also, WTF. Glad to see that simply halting the excess
consumption should allow her body to repair the imbalance over time.

~~~
YokoZar
At some point you wonder if putting more teabags into the same pitcher doesn't
actually make it any stronger. There's gotta be a saturation point for tea
solutes. Except maybe for the flouride in them.

~~~
eksith
It stops being stronger at some point I think. The water can only hold so much
of the infusion. I have no scientific evidence other than my own observations
-- and that's far from scientific.

"Too much" is generally a relative term depending on where you're from
(although this lady didn't fit the customs of the locale) since people drink
it both in the morning, evening and stometimes in the afternoon.

These cases also tend to show up in Sri Lanka, which has a tea culture as
well. We also need to keep in mind that some areas have naturally high levels
of fluoride in the groundwater. Without reading the detailed article (TBA),
it's hard to tell if that played a part too.

Edit: Something smells fishy.

 _Pass it on: A 47-year-old U.S. woman developed a bone disease after drinking
a pitcher of tea a day for 17 years._

The actual case hasn't been published in detail and the link to the case :
<http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMicm1200995>

But it mentions: _Brewed tea has one of the highest fluoride contents among
beverages in the United States._ I'd like to see some actual backup of that
with hard data.

~~~
phaus
When I make tea, I find that as little as an extra 3g of tea, or an extra
minute of steeping can ruin an entire pot. I can't imagine dumping several
ounces of dried tea leaves into a single pot of tea, which is pretty much what
this lady was doing.

~~~
eksith
Agreed. At the most, tea should be left to infuse for 1 minute (loose tea less
than that), especially for Black tea blends. Any more and it just kills the
flavor.

I'm willing to bet she was doing it for some sort of DIY health thing. People
do silly things like over-doing something if they think it's good for you.
Well, that then makes it bad for you.

There's a great book on all this called The Book of Tea by Okakura Kakuzo :

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Tea>

A very good read on the subject. I think Google Books probably has a free
translation.

~~~
eru
> Agreed. At the most, tea should be left to infuse for 1 minute (loose tea
> less than that), especially for Black tea blends. Any more and it just kills
> the flavor.

Depends. I can leave my Pu-Erh in overnight, and the flavour is still fine.
(But Pu-Erh is well known for that.)

~~~
eksith
Pu-erh is not like ordinary loose tea so it's quite safe to do that. Without
stirring or pressing, you don't get too much of the flavor into the water and
it's much more coarse. You'll find a lot of the green teas also don't over-
flavor the water because of this.

~~~
eru
Yes. I guess your 1-minute rule is more appropriate for black teas than
anything else. I like my teas more overbrewed in any case.

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acabal
Too much of anything is going to mess with your body. I would have been
surprised if drinking the equivalent of 100 tea bags daily for 17 years
_didn't_ mess this woman up.

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Shenglong
I am disgusted that they chose to measure _tea_ in _bags_.

/teasnob

~~~
eru
Yes. But it seems that lady made her tea from bags.

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lenazegher
This is pure fluff.

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Daishiman
Linkbait headline. You probably shouldn't each 50 packs of artificial
sweetener a day either, or 5 pounds of ice cream.

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rbanffy
"100 tea bags daily, for 17 years" almost qualifies as an OCD.

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advm
<http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1174>

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OGinparadise
_after she drank a pitcher of tea made from at least 100 tea bags daily, for
17 years, researchers report._

Duh! Also 100 tea bags daily is a lot more than what people call "too much"!

Too much water will also cause death
[http://www.smh.com.au/national/bushwalker-died-from-
drinking...](http://www.smh.com.au/national/bushwalker-died-from-drinking-too-
much-water-20120917-2621c.html)

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WayneDB
Was there ever any proof that _drinking_ fluoride prevents cavities? (As
opposed to applying it directly to the teeth.)

