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If you’ve ever needed serious motivation to tamp down your caffeine habit, maybe try running into a gut parasite. Hollywood actor Claire Foy claims that’s one major reason why she stopped drinking over a dozen cups of tea a day.
Today, the 41-year-old Foy disclosed her gastrointestinal plight in an interview with the Table Manners podcast. She reportedly struggled with her parasites for at least five years. Giving up her heavy caffeine use seems to have helped Foy root out the infestation, however.
“Quite a few years ago, I had parasites. Gross,” Foy said.
The British actor, perhaps best known for her leading role in The Crown, said she caught her “stomach parasites” during a trip to Morocco.
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Foy didn’t go into many specifics about the nature of her infection, but she experienced symptoms commonly seen with parasitic infestations of the gut, such as unexplained changes in her weight. And she appears to have had double trouble.
“I kept losing weight, and I didn’t know what was going on. They travel as a pair. I got told by the doctor, gross, absolutely rank. It’s disgusting,” she said.
Foy stated that she didn’t want to endure the strain of “hardcore antibiotics” to manage her infection (she may have meant antimicrobials in general, though there are some medicines that can treat both bacterial and parasitic infections). So she instead made extensive changes to her diet. Part of that change involved relinquishing her love of caffeine—no easy task given that she regularly drank at least 15 cups of tea and 2 cups of coffee a day.
Not much research exists on the topic of caffeine exacerbating parasitic infections. Interestingly enough, at least one study found that caffeine could possibly extend the lifespan of worms in the wild. And long-term caffeine consumption does seem to affect the composition of our gut microbiome, the community of bacteria and other microbes that normally live along the digestive tract.
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Either way, it’s likely for the best that Foy eased her caffeine habit. While tea may have health benefits, experts generally recommend only drinking between two and four cups a day, not 15. And too much caffeine, meanwhile, can raise the risk of cardiovascular problems.
So long as your daily count of caffeinated drinks isn’t reaching into the dozens, you’re fine. But if it’s anywhere close to Foy’s past record, you should definitely consider lowering it—even if you don’t currently have a gross parasite calling your gut home.
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