Absolutely not true at all.

How many studies should I show you that use green tea _extract_, not green tea?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30174618

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29429153

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28904061

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28585735

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27806972

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27062963

etc.

Even studies with just "Green Tea" in their titles use green tea extracts: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27797683

It's obvious that the public would not be interested in green tea without all the studies using concentrated green tea extracts.

You're aware that beta carotene, which was hailed as a super food suplement before the term even existet turned out to be carcinogenic? Uups!

I'm not a food scientist, but believe it's extremely problematic to focus on one component or ingredient of something, which is a rather complex combination of a lot of ingredients in a product. Green tea extract may not act the same as actual green tea for umteen reasons.

Another point is cultural context. I'm convinced (and may be talking out of my arse, but I'm still convinced) that part of what makes something like the mediterrean diet successful is cultural context. People take the time to sit down to lunch and dinner. And this matters.

If you try to repackage the exact same ingredients and wolf it down in 10 minutes in front of a tv, or during lunch at your desk it's not the same thing and does not provide the same benefits.

You're free to put me down as some esotheric crank. But my conviction is that a healthy diet is a mixture of not too much crap and sometimes a bit crap, because it's fun and makes you feel good and gives you pleasure.

Nutrition, in my opinion, is much more complex than the ingredients that you put into your body.

edit: A couple spellos

You are ignoring the most comprehensive studies. Population analysis. There are populations that drink green tea regularly as a matter of tradition. Thats how this shit was discovered in the first place.

Compared to hundreds of studies about green tea extracts, many of them reported by the media, those population-wide studies had minimal effects on the public. And even those studies would usually find the largest effects on people who drink impractically large amounts of green tea, e.g. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3103781/ or http://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/722554/relationship-betwee... (6 cups per day!). In addition, there are many confounding factors with population-wide studies compared to clinical studies.

Honestly its not impractical if you just replace your coffee with it. I probably average over 6 cups per day, and don’t really do it out of any health concern at all.

6 cups of green tea per day isn't anything unusual. There's always tea ready at home (my wife is Japanese). And at work I drink much more coffee than 3 (normal) cups. I don't drink coffee at home though. But I'm getting a lot of green (and other) tea instead.

I drink about 1,5 liters of green tea nearly every day, nothing impractical about it.

Population studies don't have control groups and are largely worthless for recommending supplementation. There are just too many confounding factors.