Green Tea Oil
What You Might Not Know About Green Tea Oil
You have no doubt heard of the benefits of green tea to your overall health, but have you heard about green tea oil. Green tea oil, also known as tea tree oil, has several medicinal uses as well. To begin, however, don’t let the name fool you, this is an essential oil, and humans should not ingest it as a tea.
Danger: If you swallow green tea oil, you are likely to experience sleepiness, disorientation, hallucinations, dizziness, muscle weakness, nausea, defecation problems, blood problems, gastro-intestinal aches, and maybe even coma. In other words: DO NOT SWALLOW THIS, IT IS NOT TEA! In fact, you should treat this as a toxic substance (which when swallowed, it is) and keep it well out of the hands and paws of children and pets.
Green Tea Oil in Soap and For Treatments of Skin Irritation
Green tea oil has many great uses, however. One of them is as a skin cleanser. This is why you will sometimes find green tea oil as a major ingredient in some soaps. But there are added benefits in soap as well. Green tea oil does a good job of reducing the effects of flaky skin and skin rashes. It also works well as a skin softener.
Green tea oil is also helpful against other skin problems. In one study, a tea tree oil solution made a significant impact on acne.
Green tea soap also has positive effects as a relaxant as well. Its fumes help people become calm in the same way that lavender scent does.
Helps Prevent and Fight off Staph-infection
Tea tree oil may also be useful in fighting off bacterial infections like the staphylococcus aureus bacteria that has recently escaped the confines of medical facilities to which it had been confined. The staph-bacteria cause extreme skin irritation. For patients who have acquired this virus and whose other topical medications are causing negative side effects, it may be useful to ask their doctors about using this milder alternative.
Tea tree oil may also be helpful since many types of Staph are now resistant to anti-biotics. Tea tree oil is only a topical solution, however, and patients should not use it to fight nasal staph-infections.
As an Anti-Fungal Agent
Yet another use of tea tree oil is as an anti-fungal agent. Researchers have shown tea tree oil to be good at fighting fungus though these results have only been tested in lab settings. No human study has yet confirmed these findings.
However, one fungus that scientists have confirmed the tea tree oil’s effectiveness against is the Malassezia fungus, the fungus responsible for the majority of dandruff in this country. So, if you shampoo your scalp with a solution of the oil you are likely to the kill the fungus.
Cure for Candida?
Tea tree oil has been found to be effective against the Candida yeast that may cause infections in those who are already immunosupressed. Unfortunately, just as with other anti-fungals, researchers have only shown this result in lab tests.
Treatment for Herpes?
Some very early evidence indicates that tea tree oil may also help against the herpes virus. These findings, however, are only in its very early stages and may turn out to be a dead end in the long run.
Treatment for Scabies?
Some test-tube research has indicated that the oil may have some effect against scabies, a virus characterized by its strong itch and the skin irritation it causes.
Aquarium Treatment
Finally, the tea tree oil is not only for human funguses; fish lovers also commonly use it to help fight fungal infections in their fish. Researchers have shown a water treatment with tea tree oil is effective in treating fish bacteria while having less harmful side effects for fish like betas. It also helps fish to restore diseased fins.
With so many positive benefits, it’s a wonder that more people haven’t heard of green tea oil.