Why the Popular Advice to Drink Green Tea for Visceral Fat Loss Is Wrong

[00:00] The most dangerous type of fat is not the fat  we can pinch. It's the fat inside the belly   around our organs and inside the liver and the  pancreas. More and more people are aware of this   and there's more content out there which is good,  but some mistakes are being made. One thing I see  

[00:16] recommended a lot out there is drink green tea  to lose visceral fat. And that's because green   tea is high in catechins which are compounds  with anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effect.   And yes, catechins can help with weight loss and  specifically losing visceral fat. It's been shown  

[00:34] in randomized control trials. But there's a huge  catch. It depends on the amount. These trials   people are pointing to use special formulations of  green tea and drinks with very high concentrations  

[00:47] of catechins, much higher than most commercially  available green teas. In fact, these studies often   use regular green tea or a drink that has  the amount of catechins normally present in  

[01:00] run-of-the-mill green teas. They use that as the  control. They sometimes even call it the placebo.   Right? So, the control group, and they don't see  an effect on visceral fat with that. And then in   comparison in the intervention group, they use  a drink with concentrated catechins and that's  

[01:16] where they see the effect, a reduction in visceral  fat. So, all of these videos and content telling   people to drink green tea to lose visceral  fat, it's well-intentioned, but in practice,   you're not going to see the effect with the  vast majority of green teas out there. Okay,  

[01:31] how do we get around it? Well, one solution  is just drink more green tea, larger volume,   right? To get more catechins. In practice, with  most commercially available green teas, this can  

[01:43] mean drinking a couple of liters of green tea a  day to get enough catechins to get the effect. So   most people are not going to do that consistently.  It's kind of a drag. Also the content of catechins   depends on the quality of the tea, the quality of  the leaf that is used and also on the preparation  

[02:00] steps because the thing is green tea is an  infusion. Right? Most teas are infusions. You   put the leaf in water and whatever leeches out  of the leaf is what you're going to drink. So if   we use a very high quality tea, very high quality  leaves with higher concentration of catechins and  

[02:17] hotter water and longer steeping time, yeah, you  can increase the concentration of catechins in the   tea up to a point, but it's always hard to know  how much you're really getting out of it. Another   option are green tea extracts. So there's a number  of supplements commercially available, and these  

[02:34] are more concentrated in catechins because they're  extracting them from the leaf and concentrating   them. There's some evidence that these extracts,  these supplements do help with liver health and   liver fat, although we need larger trials to  be really sure. Another option for people who  

[02:49] prefer more natural strategies and this might be  the best option is matcha. So matcha is a green   powder that you can make tea with. But the thing  is matcha uses the whole leaf. Everything that's  

[03:02] in the leaf is extracted. And so the concentration  of catechins or any phytonutrients in the leaf is   going to be much higher in matcha than in regular  green tea products where it's an infusion. So  

[03:14] it's just whatever seeps out of the leaf in water.  Obviously, this is going to depend on the quality   of the matcha, how it's done, and the quality of  the leaves that they use. And most companies don't   report the content of catechins. But in general,  higher quality matcha has a higher concentration  

[03:31] of catechins. They call it ceremonial grade, and  these are usually Japanese brands of matcha that   are higher quality, and they're shipped from Japan  often. It's not the cheapest product, but it's one   option. I've seen it around $50 to $100 for a  tin that lasts you probably about a month, give  

[03:50] or take, if you're doing it daily. So, might not  break the bank by itself, but it's also not the   cheapest thing out there. We also dug around and  we found two companies that sell matcha products   that actually report the content of catechins.  And by the way, I have no relationship with these  

[04:06] companies. So this is one company called matcha  therapy. And they guarantee a minimum content of   a specific catechin called EGCG. It's basically  the most active kind of catechin in green teas  

[04:18] and in matcha. And it's thought to be behind most  of the benefits of these products. So they have a   EGCG 30+ and that means they guarantee at least 30  milligrams of EGCG per gram of the matcha powder  

[04:33] and then a 60+, a 90+ and a 130+, increasing  concentration of EGCG. So which one of these   is best and are they enough? Is that enough EGCG  in there? I went over every randomized trial that  

[04:46] I could find looking at matcha products and liver  fat or visceral fat loss treatments with low doses   of the product amounting to about 15 milligrams  of EGCG which is roughly in the ballpark of green  

[05:00] teas out there. Most kind of run-of-the-mill  green teas those don't work. So you don't see   a reduction in liver fat or visceral fat. Then  around 50 milligrams, and this is daily intake,   50 milligrams of EGCG, you start seeing results.  You start seeing a reduction in visceral fat or  

[05:17] liver fat. One trial compared 50 milligrams to  84 milligrams of EGCG. Both worked, both reduced   liver fat. And the 84 milligram treatment seemed  a little stronger, kind of stronger reduction. So  

[05:32] you might be better off closer to 100 than closer  to 50, although both seem to give you some effect.   Does it increase even further? What happens at  even higher doses? There's a pooled analysis that  

[05:44] looked at six randomized trials pooled together  and most of the trials were either around 100 or   200 milligrams a day of EGCG and there was no  obvious difference in the effect. They seem to  

[05:59] be about equivalent. So it seems like around 100  milligrams a day of EGCG, ballpark, gives you all   you need. So looking at this matcha therapy range  of products and based on what I've seen from the  

[06:11] trials, the educated guess would be that the 30+  might be too low. 60+ you should start seeing   results and the 90 or 130 should give you a little  stronger results. Is there a difference between 90  

[06:24] and 130? No idea. We don't have granular enough  trials to confidently say. So it's whatever the   person prefers. Now there's one issue with this  brand. I looked at the website. They ship to all  

[06:36] kinds of European countries and Canada, but for  some reason they don't ship to the US. And I know   we have a lot of viewers in the US. So, we wanted  to find another brand that would serve that market   as well. So, we found this other brand called  Got Matcha, and it seems to ship both to the US  

[06:50] and Europe and other places, too, I believe. And  so, looking at their website, the range that they   report, it seems about in the range of the other  product of the matcha therapy, about 60 to 90   milligs of EGCG per gram of this product. And so  one to two grams of that daily in water in a tea  

[07:09] should give you the desired effect based on the  evidence we have. So these are the only two brands   I've ever seen that measure EGCG and report it.  If you are aware of others, by all means share in   the comments for people to see. Okay, couple very  important points. You don't want to go overboard  

[07:25] with these products. There is some evidence that  EGCG doses that are very high, over 800 milligrams   a day, can cause some problems, can cause some  liver toxicity. So I would stay well under that  

[07:38] 100ish, and we're talking about milligrams of  EGCG, the specific catechin in the powder. We're   not talking about the total weight of powder that  you're going to consume where you can consume a  

[07:50] gram or two. That's not an issue per se. It's  the amount of EGCGs that you don't want to go   crazy. Also, caffeine improves the bioavailability  of EGCG. So, you can get more out of it if you   consume it together with some caffeine. Now, green  tea and matcha already includes some caffeine  

[08:06] because that's present in the green tea leaf,  right? Unless it's a green tea product that's   been decaffeinated. And this is also good to know  for people who have hypersensitivity to caffeine,  

[08:18] who don't do well, who get jittery. Matcha and  green tea could trigger some of those issues   for some people. There's one food component that  has been shown to cut liver fat in half. And we  

[08:30] covered that in a recent video. I'll link it right  here. Check it out, and I'll see you in there.