Industrial Revolution[edit]
Some scholars suggest that tea played a role in British Industrial Revolution. Afternoon tea possibly became a way to increase the number of hours labourers could work in factories (e.g. trolley service); the stimulants in the tea, accompanied by sugary snacks (such as cream horns) would give workers energy to finish out the day's work. Further, tea helped alleviate some of the consequences of the urbanization that accompanied the industrial revolution: drinking tea required boiling the water, thereby killing water-borne diseases like dysentery, cholera, and typhoid.[31]