The Daily Coffee News released an article titled, “Coffee’s Funky Little Cousin Kratom is About to Become an Illegal Drug.” The article reads in part as follows;
“Coffee’s funky little cousin kratom may finally be banned by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, graduating to a controlled substance from merely being a “drug or chemical of concern.”
The plant and its derivatives have been used for recreational and medicinal purposes in Southeast Asia for as long as anyone can remember, and the DEA’s proposed criminalization of kratom has sparked protests in Washington, D.C., and a petition with more than 120,000 signatures.
Indigenous to Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia, Myanmar, and Papua New Guinea — all of which, not coincidentally, are coffee origins — kratom is the anglicized word for Mitragyna Speciosa, a tropical plant in the coffee (Rubiaceae) family, and its leaves bear a striking resemblance.”
I’d like to state my opinion: kratom is not a dangerous chemical. It is NOT a “legal high” any more than coffee is. It has what is known as “plateau effects” which is caused by the poor binding efficiency to receptors. Now, I know eyes will glaze over as soon as they see the word opioid-receptor (if anyone even looks at this letter), BUT the primary receptor that is stimulated is the kappa-opioid receptor, one of the many permutations found within our body (Thongpradichote, 1998). This IS NOT the same receptor that diacetyl-morphine (heroin) stimulates, which is the mu-opioid receptor. So, this plateau effect means that only so many poorly binding molecules can activate the receptors, regardless of how high a dose a person takes.
As a matter of fact, once you’ve taken a large dose, it begins to act on other systems, which in turn DECREASE the effects felt. Additionally, an excessively large dose makes the individual feel nauseous and have what is called the “wobbles,” which is a sensation of nystagmus. This doesn’t really impair one, other than the obvious: do not operate heavy machinery or drive; instead, it makes you feel ill for up to 30 minutes before going away. From such a dose, one realizes that they don’t want to consume servings that size. Due to this fact, addiction risk is minimized, and withdrawals (obviously vary per person) are minimal if at all existent. They consist of feeling a bit lethargic for 2-4 days, similar to not having had your morning cup of coffee, you might also have an extra bowel movement a day during those days, and you might feel a bit restless. Kratom was actually found to have “had no opiatelike dependence syndrome” (Jansen, 1988) when being tested for use as an analgesic in the 1980’s.
What we truly need is our excellent government to represent our interests and offer us protections from people trying to make money, not the parenting of the DEA giving us ultimatums on a “poorly” researched compound. For example, when people realize they can make a quick buck, they will sell anything as was the case with 9 deaths. These folks ingested unknown quantities of a “legal high” product called Krypton, which was mainly the schedule 2 substance from the painkiller Tramadol, mixed with kratom. Tramadol has been long known to cause seizures in humans and is reserved for veterinary purposes, and for individuals who cannot handle opiate narcotics. These 9 individuals had blood concentrations of the active compound in kratom of 0.02 – 0.18 micrograms per gram of blood. The “recreational levels” serum blood levels are 10 – 50 micrograms per gram of blood (Kronstrand, 2011). Think about those numbers; the people who died due to the tramadol, the scheduled narcotic compounds had 100 – 1000 times lower levels (just shift the decimal place over until the numbers fall into the recreational range) of kratom’s active compounds in their blood than they should have to be getting the minimal “recreational” effects. It is obvious that this substance had little to do with these deaths…Due to people who create these awful, deceitful, and harmful blends of synthetic narcotics with the natural ground leaves of the kratom tree, a handful of individuals have had negative side effects (although the deaths pale in comparison to other household products, like laundry detergent pods, which had over 7,000 poision control calls during the 6-month period leading up the DEA’s announcement, while kratom and all these “dirty” mixtures totaled around 300 calls during the two-year period that the DEA cites).
What we need is for the FDA to regulate the purity and quality of these herbal supplements. Let’s regulate and tax this supplement so that the people who consume this substance will be safe. As unfortunate as it is, banning it by scheduling this substance will halt research. We have seen it again and again, when something is scheduled, research halts, regulation halts, and the only thing that takes place is the marginalization and incarceration of the poor and people of color. Alternatively, we could schedule laundry detergent pods…
References:
Jansen, K. L., & Prast, C. J. (1988). Psychoactive properties of mitragynine (kratom). Journal of psychoactive drugs, 20(4), 455-457.
Kronstrand, R.; Roman, M.; Thelander, G.; Eriksson, A. (2011). “Unintentional Fatal Intoxications with Mitragynine and O-Desmethyltramadol from the Herbal Blend Krypton”. Journal of Analytical Toxicology. 35 (4): 242–7. doi:10.1093/anatox/35.4.242. PMID 21513619
Thongpradichote, S., Matsumoto, K., Tohda, M., Takayama, H., Aimi, N., Sakai, S. I., & Watanabe, H. (1998). Identification of opioid receptor subtypes in antinociceptive actions of supraspinally-admintstered mitragynine in mice. Life Sciences, 62(16), 1371-1378.