Your Health: May 27, 2002

NO BONES ABOUT IT Regular tea drinking may strengthen bones, say researchers in Taiwan. After surveying more than 1,000 men and women 30 and older, scientists found that people who drank an average of nearly two cups of tea--black, green or oolong--daily for 10 years had a 6.2% greater hipbone density than occasional drinkers. Scientists suspect that fluoride, flavonoids and phytoestrogens--a few of the 4,000 health-affecting chemical compounds found in tea--may help preserve bone-mineral density.

ALZHEIMER'S HOPE? Researchers have discovered a substance that appears to prevent the formation of amyloid plaques, which are implicated in such diseases as Alzheimer's, amyloidosis and Type 2 diabetes. Doctors hope to start a clinical trial within weeks using the experimental drug CPHPC on Alzheimer's patients.

CINDERELLA SYNDROME It may be good for the soul, but researchers say housework doesn't do much for the heart. University of Bristol scientists studied 2,341 British women ages 60 to 79 and found that heavy housework--vacuuming, washing windows and floors--had no effect on their health or weight. Women who spent 21/2 hours a week doing such chores may have burned extra calories but were neither less obese nor had lower resting heart rates than those who did no cleaning at all. --By Sora Song

Sources: Archives of Internal Medicine; Nature; Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health