Camomile tea is often recommended for frayed nerves and to encourage a good night’s sleep but now researchers believe it may also help to manage diabetes and help prevent complications arising from the condition, such as blindness, kidney damage and nerve and circulatory damage.

The study, published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, looked at the effects of chamomile tea on the health of rats with type 2 diabetes. The rats given an extract similar to chamomile tea saw the amount of sugar in their blood fall by a quarter. The researchers from Aberystwyth University in Wales and the University of Toyama in Japan believe that taken with meals each day, the tea may also protect against hyperglycemia – a potentially fatal condition that is caused by high blood sugar levels.

 

As a cup or two of camomile tea a day can be relaxing anyway, it is worth seeing whether it may also help to balance blood sugar levels. Balanced blood sugar levels are crucial for weight management and hormone balance.

 

Chamomile tea is made from fragrant flowers and leaves of the camomile plant which was used for medicinal purposes by the ancient Greeks, Egyptians and Romans. Today it is often used for relaxation purposes but other studies show that it can also help fight off colds and ease menstrual cramps. Scientists think that the herbal tea can boost the immune system, making it easer to ward off infection.

Australian research published in the Journal Ophthalmology has found that children who spend the most time outdoors have better eyesight than those who stay indoors. It seems that regular exposure to natural light for up to two or three hours a day can have the risk of short sightedness or myopia in some children. The scientists believe that chemicals released by the eye in bright light can somehow protect it, whether a child is playing in the park, sitting at the beach or running around in the garden.

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Physiotherapists at the Griffith University in Queensland, Australia, asked children with an average age of 14 to perform a ten minute warm up of star jumps, side lunges and skipping twice a week before their PE sessions. At the start of the eight month study the children could only manage around 50 jumps but by the end they could do 300 and their bone and muscle strength had improved significantly as a result.

Approximately 80 percent of bone mass is accrued in the first 20 years of life and especially around puberty because of circulating hormones so, according to this new study, children should be encouraged to jump and skip as often as possible to boost the health of their bones.