Health Note: Herbal Tea CURWOOD: Coming up, when nature meets the subdivision. Mountain lions come a calling on a South Dakota neighborhood. First, this Environmental Health Note from Diane Toomey. TOOMEY: Many people are turning, these days, to herbal teas as a healthy alternative to caffeinated drinks. But some of those beverages may have their own downside. Researchers in Great Britain studied the erosive effect of certain herbal teas on tooth enamel. They brewed up black currant, ginseng, and vanilla tea for their experiment. Then they placed extracted teeth in baths of the various teas for 14 days. Thats the equivalent of drinking three cups a day for 18 years. For comparison, they also placed teeth in solutions of regular black tea, as well as water. The researchers found that enamel on the teeth in the herbal solutions eroded five times faster, compared to teeth bathed in black tea. Researchers say thats because the herbal teas were made from fruits with high acid content and its the acid that damaged the tooth enamel. The researchers say their results indicate that regular consumption of herbal teas based on citrus fruits may have a cumulative effect. And so they advised teetotalers to think about how much herbal tea they drink every day. Thats this weeks health update, Im Diane Toomey. CURWOOD: And youre listening to Living on Earth. currant (n)1 : a small seedless raisin grown chiefly in the Levant 小粒的無子葡萄乾 2 : the acid edible fruit of several shrubs (genus Ribes) of the saxifrage family; also : a plant bearing currants 植物紅醋栗vanilla (n) 1 a : VANILLA BEAN b : a commercially important extract of the vanilla bean that is used especially as a flavoring 2 : any of a genus (Vanilla) of tropical American climbing epiphytic orchids 香草, 蘭科植物的一種, 產於美洲熱帶地區Questions:1. Do you like tea or coffee? Or both? Why the choice? Do you know of their good and bad to human health? 2. What do you do to protect your teeth? If you drink a lot of fruit tea, and you care a lot of your teeth, what are the ways that you can think of to protect your teeth? 3. How do you think the scientists get the equivalent three cups a day for 18 years? 4. Based on your equivalent calculation above, what will be your suspicion in this equivalent calculation in a rigorous mind set? Why? 5. How do you measure/quantify the erosive magnitude scientifically?