In OTL, about a third of the world's adult population consumes tobacco in one form or another, with massive effects on public health. This is remarkable for a drug that was entirely unknown outside of Mesoamerica and the Eastern seaboard of North America until the 16th century. Like most people born before the 1990s, I personally had to put up with its ubiquitous presence in public spaces whether I wanted to or not, which has, I confess, given me opinions about it--opinions that haven't mellowed from seeing kids at my school try to vape indoors in violation of the rules.
Hence the challenge: what would be the smallest and most plausible POD necessary to preempt the worldwide spread of tobacco, and what would the consequences be in the modern era? I assume they would appear early on, since the absence of tobacco as a cash crop would likely impact the fortunes of colonial Virginia, probably resulting in a different pattern of settlement in British North America.
Hence the challenge: what would be the smallest and most plausible POD necessary to preempt the worldwide spread of tobacco, and what would the consequences be in the modern era? I assume they would appear early on, since the absence of tobacco as a cash crop would likely impact the fortunes of colonial Virginia, probably resulting in a different pattern of settlement in British North America.