China's Century of Humiliation

What if weve been lied to about the origins of the opioid epidemic? The modern opioid crisis did not begin with OxyContin, or even with the heroin epidemics of the twentieth century. Its roots reach back to the Age of Discovery, when European merchants broke into the largest consumer market the world had known. In Volume I, The O.G.s of Opioids: Origins of an Epidemic, economist Samuel Mok traces the origins of the modern opioid crisis to a fundamental question: how do you make a fortune off people who are at want of nothing? The answer transformed global trade, fueled corruption, and addicted the modern world. Britain has long maintained that it fought Qing China to defend its trade and national honour. China has never forgotten the narcotic roots of the Opium War. Now, the missing Jardine Paper, an 1839 letter from Britains leading opium merchant to the Foreign Secretary, has been transcribed. Historians across generations have searched for it. The letter reveals how British merchants envisioned the war, how Hong Kong became a Crown Colony, and why China endured the Century of Humiliation. The O.G.s of Opioids follows the cashflow. It examines how opium addressed Britain's trade imbalance with China, became intertwined with East India Company finances, and led merchants to lobby the British government for war. It also follows American money flowing through the China trade, showing how leading merchant families built fortunes while caught between British demands for redress and Qing efforts to suppress addiction. From the financiers of London to the opium dens of Canton, The O.G.s of Opioids examines how commerce, addiction, corruption, and military power converged to create a crisis whose consequences still shape the world.