Dr Ranil de Silva highlights effectiveness of green tea

Nadira GUNATILLEKE

Genetic Diagnostic and Research Laboratory and Human Brain Tissue Repository, Senior Lecturer and Principal Investigator and Sri Jayawardenapura University Medical Faculty's Anatomy Department's Neuroscience Module Committee Chairperson Dr Ranil De Silva will deliver a Lecture at the 5th Federation of Asian and Oceanian Neuroscience Societies (FAONS) Congress to be held from November 25 to 28 in Lucknow, India.

Neuroscience Nobel Laureate Prof. Torsten Wiesel will be the Guest of Honour. The scientific program comprises 22 Plenary and Invited Talks (Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Netherlands, Singapore, Sri Lanka and USA), 14 Symposia by 100 speakers, three specialist satellite symposia, oral and poster presentations.

Dr De Silva will deliver his lecture on "Collateral function of the circle of Willis and Ceylon green tea in the prevention of stroke". Stroke is the third leading cause of death and the largest cause of disability among the older people worldwide. Stroke is the second commonest cause of death in Sri Lanka. World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that one heart attack occurs every four seconds and one stroke occurs every five seconds. Stroke represents a multi factorial polygenic disorder where the role of environmental factors is well defined as opposed to the role of genetic factors, which needs to be elucidated.

Dr De Silva and Prof. Y.Z. Zhu of National University of Singapore demonstrated that Ceylon Green Tea is able to display cerebral protective effects on cultured human-brain epithelial cells.

This is a great opportunity for Sri Lanka in promoting Ceylon Green Tea as a " Health Drink" in the international markets by presenting the original scientific findings at the said prestigious congress in the presence of a distinguished gathering of over 3000 international doctors, neuroscientists from all over the Asian, Oceanian region and other parts of the world. The Tea Board and the Tea Industry at large could capitalize on these results for marketing of Ceylon Tea on the basis of its "health benefits".