The Tea Poison

"The Tea Poison – How Britain drugged an empire to pay for cheaper tea" connects your morning cup of Earl Grey to one of the largest state-sponsored drug cartels in history. In the 18th century, Britain was addicted to Chinese tea but had nothing China wanted in return, draining the British treasury of silver. The solution found by the East India Company was evil genius: Opium. Historian Caleb Winter details how Britain grew opium in India and smuggled it into China to hook the population. When China tried to ban the drug to save its people, Britain declared war in the name of "free trade." The resulting Opium Wars humiliated China and handed Hong Kong to the British. "The Tea Poison" is a dark history of globalization. It reveals the moral cost of consumerism, showing how the polite British tea habit was directly funded by the mass addiction and destruction of Chinese society.