Chocolate helps prevent cavities
Chocolate could leave you cavity free!
This is due to the benefits of tannic acid or tannins found in a variety of food like chocolate. Tannins are naturally occurring Polyphenols and prevent cavities. Polyphenols are what make wine and many other fruits astringent and make variety of flowers and autumn leaves colorful. Polyphenols also cause precipitation of proteins. What that means is that it prevents bacteria from sticking to the teeth.
The dental profession originally thought that dental disease or presence of tooth decay can be explained simply by the presence of the bacteria (in this case two families of bacteria: mutans streptococci and Lactobacillus) and presence of sugar. So don’t eat sugar and brush and floss your teeth is enough to avoid cavities. And the treatment was surgical intervention i.e. you got your teeth drilled on and a new filling was placed. But we have learned that there is more to the story. Dental caries is both infectious and transmissible. It gets transmitted from mother to the child through spoon feeding and through the entire family unit. Today primary caregivers of an infant may be a relative other than the mother or a paid nanny or au pair. They too can transmit the disease to the children. Also there are a number of people that never had any cavities as a child but started having them when they started collage. This is due to transmission of bacteria by sharing of saliva. So get a kiss with a chocolate.
We now know that tooth decay is caused by a biofilm. In nature whenever there is fluid, bacteria and a surface, biofilm forms. Biofilm is a sophisticated ecosystem of bacteria, feeding channels and waste channels. The participating bacteria shares genetic information and communicate with each other. Within the biofilm the bacteria are resistant to antibiotics. The two primary cavity forming bacterias that make up this biofilm are acidogenic (they make lactic acid that eats away good tooth structure). Normally, they form a less than 1% of the oral biofilm but something happens and then they account for 96%. This shift is PH-related. In other words, more acidic your saliva is, more bacterial biofilm is formed and more chances of cavities. A diet based on proteins and less carbohydrates makes the saliva more alkaline and prevents cavity producing bacteria from spreading. Carbohydrates make the saliva more acidic. So if you have a diet based on rice, bread and other starchy food and sweet you are more prone to cavities, sensitive teeth and teeth wear. And when it comes to chocolate, make sure you eat only high cocoa content chocolates.
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