4 ms·

> Schedule I substances are those that have the following findings: > 1. The drug or other substance has a high potential for abuse. > 2. The drug or other su

by nikcub 10y ago

> Schedule I substances are those that have the following findings: > 1. The drug or other substance has a high potential for abuse. > 2. The drug or other substance has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States. > 3. There is a lack of accepted safety for use of the drug or other substance under medical supervision Kratom doesn't meet any of those requirements, let alone all three. The scheduling process requires reform, and this impacts a large part of the world since drug scheduling (and patent protection on pharma) are part of American trade agreements. Almost every action the DEA has taken has worsened the opioid epidemic and benefited the Mexican cartels. They didn't require doctor licensing or tracking for lower-level pain medication, they were then slow to crack down on the pill mills - once a large part of the population was addicted, they were then very slow to license more methadone programs and suboxone doctors for the fresh wave of addicts, and now they want to shut down one of the only free and working treatment options (Kratom) The only result you can expect from the DEA's actions are more and more opioid deaths. It is up to 18,000 a year now - over 3x as many Americans who were killed in Iraq in total - so 3 Iraq wars per year. The NYTimes has an excellent series of stories on the opioid epidemic - the video of the woman overdosing in a supermarket while her child attempts to wake her up are shattering: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/28/us/addicted-parents-get-their-fix-even-with-children-watching.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/28/us/addicted-parents-get-th... http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/opinion/sunday/how-doctors-helped-drive-the-addiction-crisis.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/opinion/sunday/how-doctors... http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/13/well/family/opioids-may-interfere-with-parenting-instincts-study-finds.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/13/well/family/opioids-may-in...

Fargren 10y ago
>>over 3x as many Americans who were killed in Iraq in total - so 3 Iraq wars per year. I know what you mean, but it really bothers me that you are only counting American deaths. The total number of Iraqi deaths arising from the Iraq war is highly disputed, but it seems to be somewhere between 150,000 and a bit over 1,000,000, depending on the survey and whether it only counts direct deaths of combatants vs. surveys that count civilian deaths and indirect effects. In any case, deaths arising from opioids are nowhere near any amount of "Iraq wars per year".
- usefulcat 10y ago
  I remember listening to a rare press conference with President Bush in 2006. Someone asked him how many people had died as a result of the war in Iraq. To my genuine astonishment, he answered that approximately 60000 had died thus far. I couldn't decide whether to be more astonished at the figure, or that he had just given a straightforward answer to a direct question.
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  Only Americans are real people. Others are just foreign statistics. Nobody died at Stalingrad, for instance.
  - saiya-jin 10y ago
    sad but true, i guess rest of the world should all adapt to this approach and just ignore US overdose epidemics, because it doesn't matter, right?
    - adventured 10y ago
      > and just ignore US overdose epidemics Actually, that would be fine. The US doesn't need the world to pay attention to its opioid overdose problems. The world has enough problems to focus on, like millions of people still dying from malaria, or a billion people without access to clean running water or electricity. The US has plenty of tax revenue - ~$6.6 trillion annually, larger than Japan's entire economy - to deal with the problem completely on its own.
- OscarCunningham 10y ago
  Even if you only count American deaths, the majority of them were probably caused by spending money on the war that could have been spent elsewhere.
- microcolonel 10y ago
  Because this is a matter of U.S. government policy, the responsibility is to the people of the United States. Seems pretty simple to me.
xacaxulu 10y ago
It would appear that refined sugar fits this profile more than kratom does.
- microcolonel 10y ago
  Sucrose is used widely in medical treatment in the United States. Use of sucrose under medical supervision is unfathomably safe. You can literally feel, in your hand, the quantity of sucrose which is unsuitable for your diet. I'm not sure what would qualify as abuse, but I'm pretty sure they don't consider all recreational alcohol use to be abuse even though a pretty large chunk of the people who drink it are alcoholics.
arkades 10y ago
>> Schedule I substances are those that have the following >>findings: >> 1. The drug or other substance has a high potential for >>abuse. >> 2. The drug or other substance has no currently accepted >>medical use in treatment in the United States. >> 3. There is a lack of accepted safety for use of the >>drug or other substance under medical supervision >Kratom doesn't meet any of those requirements, let alone >all three. The scheduling process requires reform, and >this impacts a large part of the world since drug >scheduling (and patent protection on pharma) are part of >American trade agreements. Mitragynine, the major alkaloid identified from Kratom, has been reported as a partial opioid agonist producing similar or more potent effects than morphine. An interesting minor alkaloid of Kratom, 7-hydroxymitragynine, has been reported to be significantly more potent than morphine. (Actually, in studies, mitragynine was shown to be 13x more potent than morphine, and 7-hydroxymitragynine to be 4x more potent than mitragynine, as per Vicknasingam et al 2010 in the International Journal of Drug Policy, and Matsumoto et al., 2005, Life Sciences). Both Kratom alkaloids are reported to activate supraspinal mu- and delta- opioid receptors, explaining their use by chronic narcotics users to ameliorate opioid withdrawal symptoms. The problem here isn't getting rid of a "legal high." Kratom should not be: it carries all the risks of opiates, and may have an independent mechanism of seizure activity. Physiologic dependence has also been reported, as well as thyroid dysfunction, liver damage, and if mixed with another opioid agonist (tramadol is easy to score on the street, as a very common med for diabetic neuropathic pain) it'll put you right in the ground, as has been seen in a number of deaths in Sweden. You're right it doesn't meet all three criteria, although it certainly meets 1 and 2. 3 is a valid basis for conducting for medical research, to determine proper pharmacokinetics and see what safe usage scenarios are. However, it's a serious drug, and needs to be regulated as such. It should not be Schedule I, the DEA's favorite way of creating job security for itself, but it seems like the opposition position that has developed is yelling "keep it freely available," which is unconscionable.
- wikikra 10y ago
  It is extremely misleading to compare the binding affinity of a partial mu opioid agonist with profoundly different molecular structure to the binding affinity of a full mu opioid agonist. Mitragynine is not 13x more potent than morphine in any effect observed in vivo. Preliminary research shows that the novel binding mechanism of mitragynine results in drastically different effects (supposedly by selective avoidance of beta arrestin activation). For instance, it does not cause respiratory depression to a significant extent in mammals. Thyroid dysfunction and liver damage have never been demonstrated in a study, and anecdotal reports do not seem to suggest that they occur. The deaths in Sweden were attributed to an isolated metabolite of tramadol that is sold as a research chemical and was mixed into powdered kratom leaf. There is no evidence that kratom contributed to those deaths. I encourage you to read the "Talk" section of the Wikipedia page before repeating claims in the article without context. The effects of kratom are extremely mild, you vomit quickly if you take too much, the withdrawal symptoms are comparable to caffeine, and there has never been a death attributed to kratom alone.

by nikcub 10y ago

Fargren 10y ago

>>over 3x as many Americans who were killed in Iraq in total - so 3 Iraq wars per year. I know what you mean, but it really bothers me that you are only counting American deaths. The total number of Iraqi deaths arising from the Iraq war is highly disputed, but it seems to be somewhere between 150,000 and a bit over 1,000,000, depending on the survey and whether it only counts direct deaths of combatants vs. surveys that count civilian deaths and indirect effects. In any case, deaths arising from opioids are nowhere near any amount of "Iraq wars per year".

usefulcat 10y ago
I remember listening to a rare press conference with President Bush in 2006. Someone asked him how many people had died as a result of the war in Iraq. To my genuine astonishment, he answered that approximately 60000 had died thus far. I couldn't decide whether to be more astonished at the figure, or that he had just given a straightforward answer to a direct question.
madaxe_again 10y ago
Only Americans are real people. Others are just foreign statistics. Nobody died at Stalingrad, for instance.
- saiya-jin 10y ago
  sad but true, i guess rest of the world should all adapt to this approach and just ignore US overdose epidemics, because it doesn't matter, right?
  - adventured 10y ago
    > and just ignore US overdose epidemics Actually, that would be fine. The US doesn't need the world to pay attention to its opioid overdose problems. The world has enough problems to focus on, like millions of people still dying from malaria, or a billion people without access to clean running water or electricity. The US has plenty of tax revenue - ~$6.6 trillion annually, larger than Japan's entire economy - to deal with the problem completely on its own.
OscarCunningham 10y ago
Even if you only count American deaths, the majority of them were probably caused by spending money on the war that could have been spent elsewhere.
microcolonel 10y ago
Because this is a matter of U.S. government policy, the responsibility is to the people of the United States. Seems pretty simple to me.

xacaxulu 10y ago

It would appear that refined sugar fits this profile more than kratom does.

microcolonel 10y ago
Sucrose is used widely in medical treatment in the United States. Use of sucrose under medical supervision is unfathomably safe. You can literally feel, in your hand, the quantity of sucrose which is unsuitable for your diet. I'm not sure what would qualify as abuse, but I'm pretty sure they don't consider all recreational alcohol use to be abuse even though a pretty large chunk of the people who drink it are alcoholics.

arkades 10y ago

>> Schedule I substances are those that have the following >>findings: >> 1. The drug or other substance has a high potential for >>abuse. >> 2. The drug or other substance has no currently accepted >>medical use in treatment in the United States. >> 3. There is a lack of accepted safety for use of the >>drug or other substance under medical supervision >Kratom doesn't meet any of those requirements, let alone >all three. The scheduling process requires reform, and >this impacts a large part of the world since drug >scheduling (and patent protection on pharma) are part of >American trade agreements. Mitragynine, the major alkaloid identified from Kratom, has been reported as a partial opioid agonist producing similar or more potent effects than morphine. An interesting minor alkaloid of Kratom, 7-hydroxymitragynine, has been reported to be significantly more potent than morphine. (Actually, in studies, mitragynine was shown to be 13x more potent than morphine, and 7-hydroxymitragynine to be 4x more potent than mitragynine, as per Vicknasingam et al 2010 in the International Journal of Drug Policy, and Matsumoto et al., 2005, Life Sciences). Both Kratom alkaloids are reported to activate supraspinal mu- and delta- opioid receptors, explaining their use by chronic narcotics users to ameliorate opioid withdrawal symptoms. The problem here isn't getting rid of a "legal high." Kratom should not be: it carries all the risks of opiates, and may have an independent mechanism of seizure activity. Physiologic dependence has also been reported, as well as thyroid dysfunction, liver damage, and if mixed with another opioid agonist (tramadol is easy to score on the street, as a very common med for diabetic neuropathic pain) it'll put you right in the ground, as has been seen in a number of deaths in Sweden. You're right it doesn't meet all three criteria, although it certainly meets 1 and 2. 3 is a valid basis for conducting for medical research, to determine proper pharmacokinetics and see what safe usage scenarios are. However, it's a serious drug, and needs to be regulated as such. It should not be Schedule I, the DEA's favorite way of creating job security for itself, but it seems like the opposition position that has developed is yelling "keep it freely available," which is unconscionable.

wikikra 10y ago
It is extremely misleading to compare the binding affinity of a partial mu opioid agonist with profoundly different molecular structure to the binding affinity of a full mu opioid agonist. Mitragynine is not 13x more potent than morphine in any effect observed in vivo. Preliminary research shows that the novel binding mechanism of mitragynine results in drastically different effects (supposedly by selective avoidance of beta arrestin activation). For instance, it does not cause respiratory depression to a significant extent in mammals. Thyroid dysfunction and liver damage have never been demonstrated in a study, and anecdotal reports do not seem to suggest that they occur. The deaths in Sweden were attributed to an isolated metabolite of tramadol that is sold as a research chemical and was mixed into powdered kratom leaf. There is no evidence that kratom contributed to those deaths. I encourage you to read the "Talk" section of the Wikipedia page before repeating claims in the article without context. The effects of kratom are extremely mild, you vomit quickly if you take too much, the withdrawal symptoms are comparable to caffeine, and there has never been a death attributed to kratom alone.