The Guardian published the following article titled, “Federal crackdown on drug some say treats opioid addiction faces backlash.” The article reads in part as follows;
“When the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) announced last week that it intended to impose its strictest regulations on a drug that many claim can help treat opioid addiction, the public outcry was immediate.
“This hit us out of the blue,” said Susan Ash, the founder of the American Kratom Association. At the end of August, the DEA announced its intention to define kratom, a south-east Asian plant, and its active chemical components as a schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act, along with cannabis, heroin, and other drugs that are deemed to have a high potential for abuse and no recognized medical use.
“I’m hearing people that are terrified, literally scared to death of going back to old ways of life, whether that means living in chronic pain when nothing else has worked for them, dealing with PTSD, listening to all the people fearful that they’re going to go back on either prescribed or illicit opiates and possibly could die,” said Ash. “It’s very emotional.”
Russ Bayer of the DEA said the agency “made the determination after a review of some of the scientific and medical literature out in the world that kratom poses such an imminent threat”.
Kratom, which is botanically related to coffee, is currently not regulated at all and can be obtained through any number of companies on the internet or at health food or smoke shops. Some users say they would like it to be more strictly regulated – so they could be sure they are actually getting the plant and not other chemicals – but they think it is ridiculous to say it has no currently accepted medical usage.”
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