The Drug Enforcement Administration has received a torrent of backlash from patients with chronic pain and former opiate users after announcing plans to ban kratom, a plant gaining popularity across the United States for its opiate-like effects.
Kratom, which originates in Southeast Asia, has become more widespread in the United States in the past decade, fueled by online testimonials from users and a lack of federal regulation. Advocates say the plant — typically crushed and mixed or brewed with water — poses few health risks while helping users relieve severe pain and overcome addictions to powerful prescription painkillers.
The DEA recently announced a temporary federal ban on kratom beginning Sept. 30. The active chemicals in the plant will be placed on Schedule 1 of the Controlled Substances Act, the most restrictive regulatory category, designated for substances with no medical use and a high potential for abuse.
Still, Hudak said, the strict scheduling of kratom would make it harder for researchers to access the drug, which could limit the very research that the DEA says is necessary to determine whether it has medical benefits.
"A lower scheduling might actually spur that type of research for these natural substances," Hudak said. "It's not necessarily going to happen under Schedule 1."
Some researchers say that the DEA's reasoning for the ban is shaky and that cracking down on kratom could push users to more dangerous and addictive opiates.
The people using kratom are often "in pain or addicted" to other drugs, said Marc Swogger, a clinical psychologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center, who has published research on kratom use. "Those are two groups that need options for improving their situations. Without those options, I'm not sure what they're going to do. Will they begin to take heroin? Will they show up for treatment and get the appropriate treatment?"
Moreover, Swogger says, the DEA's own data "do not indicate there is any public health reason for this."
In a paper last year, Swogger and co-authors wrote that, in all of the fatal overdose cases involving kratom, the users had either taken other drugs, too, or had a history of alcohol- or heroin-abuse that also could have caused or contributed to the death.
