Brewing tea removes harmful toxins from water, study finds

Tea is known to be one of the healthiest beverages — and the benefits aren’t just what’s in the cup, but what’s not in it.

The process of brewing tea was shown to remove toxic heavy metals from drinking water in a new study from Northwestern University in Illinois.

For a typical cup of tea — one mug of water and one bag of tea, brewed for three to five minutes — the preparation could remove about 15% of lead from drinking water, the researchers stated in a press release.

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During brewing, heavy metals like lead and cadmium are absorbed by the tea leaves, keeping them from entering the water, according to researchers.

The findings were published in the journal ACS Food Science & Technology this week.

“It appears quite likely that the way most people brew their tea can have a measurable impact on lead consumption,” ​​Benjamin Shindel, the study’s first author at Northwestern, told Fox News Digital.

The longer tea is brewed, the more reduction in metal content, he noted.

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“Any tea that steeps for longer or has higher surface area will effectively remediate more heavy metals,” Shindel said. 

“Some people brew their tea for a matter of seconds, and they are not going to get a lot of remediation. But brewing tea for longer periods or even overnight – like iced tea – will recover most of the metal or maybe even close to all the metal in the water.”

The longer tea is brewed, the more reduction in metal content, the researchers said. (iStock)

During the study, the researchers tested different types of tea, tea bags and methods of brewing to gauge how well they absorbed lead, chromium, copper, zinc and cadmium.

The absorbent effect was seen across a range of tea types, Shindel noted, even from wood-derived tea bags.  

Cellulose tea bags were found to absorb much more than cotton and nylon bags, the researchers found.

For a typical cup of tea, the preparation could remove about 15% of lead from drinking water.

Tea leaves have a “high active surface area” that makes them ideal for absorbing material, according to the researchers.

“Tea leaves with greater surface area, through processing or grinding, may see slightly more metal remediation as well,” he added. “Just put the leaves in your water and steep them, and they naturally remove metals.”

“Lead contamination of drinking water is widespread, even in schools and childcare centers,” one expert told Fox News Digital. (iStock)

The team was surprised by the effects seen after just a short time.

“We weren’t sure whether to expect any meaningful reduction in metal content during the short times that most people brew their tea,” said Shindel. 

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“We were surprised that even after just a couple of minutes, we were able to see a small but significant amount of metal remediation during the preparation of tea.”

Despite these findings, the researchers cautioned that people should not rely on tea to clean their water.  

“We were surprised that even after just a couple of minutes, we were able to see a small but significant amount of metal remediation during the preparation of tea.” (iStock)

“We’re also not public health researchers, so it remains to be seen if the levels of lead reduction we’ve observed in our study will translate to population-wide health benefits,” said Shindel.

“However, I think it’s useful for people to know that brewing tea will, on the margins, reduce one’s consumption of lead content — and perhaps other toxins — from drinking water.”

“After just a couple of minutes, we were able to see a small but significant amount of metal remediation.”

The findings could help explain why populations that drink more tea may have lower incidence rates of heart disease and stroke than populations that have lower tea consumption, Shindel noted.

“Across a population, if people drink an extra cup of tea per day, maybe over time we’d see declines in illnesses that are closely correlated with exposure to heavy metals,” he said.

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John Rumpler, lead author of the study and clean water program director for Environment America, noted that lead is highly toxic for kids.  

“Yet lead contamination of drinking water is widespread, even in schools and child care centers,” he told Fox News Digital.

“Brewing tea for longer periods or even overnight – like iced tea – will recover most of the metal or maybe even close to all the metal in the water.” (iStock)

“While I can’t quite read the tea leaves on this new study, we know there are filters certified to remove lead from drinking water,” Rumpler went on.

“Schools and child care centers should be replacing old fountains with lead-filtering water stations and replacing lead pipes wherever they can.”

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The Northwestern study was partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy.