Do you need another reason to smile about the cup of matcha in your hands? According to a 2011 scientific review on matcha and oral health – regularly drinking matcha green tea has a long list of oral health benefits – making it the energy-boosting drink of choice for many dental experts.
With matcha, you are ingesting the whole tea leaf (in powdered form) instead of just the infusion from the leaves. Which means you tap into greater nutritional benefits by ingesting more components, and all the components, of green tea. The growing and cultivation process behind producing matcha is what yields its high antioxidant levels compared to other teas and coffee.
It’s those antioxidants, such as EGCG catechins, that are at the core of green tea’s ability to boost dental and oral health long-term, and another reason to ensure matcha green tea is part of one’s daily health regime.
Drinking matcha is like giving your mouth a spa treatment. It is a powerhouse for your dental and overall mouth health, fighting off cavities, gum disease, bad breath, and even oral cancers.1
6 Green Tea Benefits for Oral Health
According to the review2, here are six incredible benefits of matcha for your oral health—and why you should seriously consider swapping your coffee for this green wonder—if you haven’t already!
- Say goodbye to bad breath (halitosis)
- Fights cavities and tooth decay
- May reverse and reduce the risk of gum decay
- May reduce risk of oral cancers
- Has anti-fungal properties to combat bad bacteria
- Doesn’t stain teeth
When it comes to your oral health, matcha is the clear winner over coffee. So, next time you’re deciding between a cup of joe and a cup of matcha, remember that there is a lot to smile about when it’s matcha in your cup!
1Green tea may target oral cancer – article. Summary: based on a study from 2014 published in the Molecular Food and Nutrition Research Journal, Green tea’s EGCG catechin antioxidant kills off oral cancer cells while leaving healthy cells alone, in fact, EGCG protects the healthy cells while causing cell death to oral cancer cells. This study was done to determine how this happens. “The problem with a lot of chemotherapy drugs — especially early chemotherapy drugs — is that they really just target rapidly dividing cells, so cancer divides rapidly, but so do cells in your hair follicles and cells in your intestines, so you have a lot of side effects,” said one of the researchers. “But you don’t see these sorts of side effects with green tea consumption.”
2Green tea enhancing oral health author credit: Vikas Singh
