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Sorry to burst your bubble but U.S. drug policy is not as progressive as you might think. Cannabis is still illegal under federal law. And right now America is

Sorry to burst your bubble but U.S. drug policy is not as progressive as you might think. Cannabis is still illegal under federal law. And right now America is petitioning the WHO for a GLOBAL ban on KRATOM, a herb which has been used in Asia for hundreds of years with no recorded deaths. It has been in use in Europe and America for a couple of decades and still there are no deaths recorded from pure Kratom use. Kratom can be used to treat or replace alcohol, cocaine and opiate addiction. It is a herb harvested from the leaves of a tree related to the coffee plant and has incredible pain relieving properties, as well as being a mild stimulant and mood regulator. For more info see this recent study https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6612999/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6612999/ And please tell the FDA and WHO not to ban this awesome herb. The deadline for comments is August 9th. https://www.americankratom.org/ https://www.americankratom.org/

tomato-sauce 5y ago
Thanks for pointing this out. I don’t know enough about kratom to have an opinion on how it should be regulated. I will add a comment though. Just because I am fundamentally opposed to America regulating drug use outside of its territory.
- fsckboy 5y ago
  https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom
  - Texaner 5y ago
    I will assume anything written under such a link to be false unless proven otherwise.
gunshai 5y ago
Come to Oregon where we just decriminalized the party.
loeg 5y ago
Kratom is fundamentally an opioid. It happens to be cheap and relatively safe (consumed by ingesting large quantities of plant matter, rather than injection or insufflation of some extremely potent compound). I think opioids are over-vilified in general, and I'm on the side of legalization, but kratom isn't magic.
jfk13 5y ago
I'm not familiar with that "awesome herb", so I wondered what other sources might have to say. While the numbers are small (unsurprisingly, if it's not nearly as widely known and used as some other substances), it may not be quite as innocuous as you seem to imply: > "A 2019 paper analyzing data from the National Poison Data System found that between 2011-2017 there were 11 deaths associated with kratom exposure. Nine of the 11 deaths reported in this study involved kratom plus other drugs and medicines, such as diphenhydramine (an antihistamine), alcohol, caffeine, benzodiazepines, fentanyl, and cocaine. Two deaths were reported following exposure from kratom alone with no other reported substances." > "In 2017, the FDA identified at least 44 deaths related to kratom, with at least one case investigated as possible use of pure kratom." (https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom) Actually, even the study you linked has some disturbing statements: > Deaths attributed to the use of Kratom have been reported in Europe and the United States but not in Southeast Asia. > The increasing trend in Kratom consumption in the West has corresponded with an increase in reports of Kratom-related exposures to Poison Control Centers in the United States, care received at a health care facility due to Kratom consumption, and association with overdose fatalities. > Kratom was identified as the cause of death by a medical examiner in 91 of the 152 Kratom-positive deaths, but was the only identified substance in just seven of these cases.
- ctoth 5y ago
  This is the most reefer madness comment I have ever seen on Hacker News. Seven possible deaths with just Kratom and this justifies banning it? How many deaths and ruined lives will those enforcing a Kratom ban be responsible for? Perhaps we should consult the history of bans of other drugs to get some idea. Anyone claiming that their reason for adding yet another substance to The Forever War on Drugs is harm reduction should be laughed out of the room at this point. I reckon that, because the Covid vaccine has been responsible for at least ten blood clots we should also set up a global ban to ensure nobody ever gets to take it.
  - jfk13 5y ago
    If you're going to label scientific papers you don't like as a "wall of FUD" [edit: I see you've decided to remove this remark], I'm not sure there's much we can discuss further. I didn't say it should be banned. Or that it shouldn't. I don't know enough to form an opinion on the question. I just wondered how balanced and objective the post from irthomasthomas was, did a quick search for other points of view, and felt it was worth offering some additional comments for consideration.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
Please don’t glorify Kratom as some sort of miracle herb without downsides. Kratom is an opioid, full stop. People are under the mistaken impression that it’s less addictive because it’s less potent on a per-gram basis, but addicts simply end up consuming more grams to get similar highs. It’s not a “mood regulator” in any magical sense other than it’s an opioid and opioids temporarily put people in good moods. There are many communities dedicated to quitting Kratom and handling Kratom withdrawal, which is the same as withdrawing from other opioids (For instance: https://www.reddit.com/r/quittingkratom/ https://www.reddit.com/r/quittingkratom/ ). Whether or not you think Kratom should be legal, we shouldn’t be glorifying it as a harmless substance that somehow defies the realities of every other opioid.
- drooogs 5y ago
  opioids are a large class of drugs with widely varying effects and potential for abuse. for instance, the active ingredient in Imodium is an opioid, but you don't see a lot of recreational Imodium users. kratom is certainly not a miracle herb, but its characteristics do make it a lot less addictive and lethal than its more popular relatives. it's not unreasonable to think it might be used in replacement therapy, similar to buprenorphine.
  - LordDragonfang 5y ago
    Using Imodium as an example really hurts your case here. Loperamide (Imodium's active ingredient) isn't used recreationally because it's not psychoactive - or more accurately, it doesn't cross the blood-brain barrier. Meanwhile, you'd be hard pressed to find an opioid which does (as kratom obviously does) that lacks recreational users.
    - netizen-936824 5y ago
      Occasionally people with opioid addictions actually do use loperamide at high doses to stave off withdrawals. But it does not have the same effects as ones that cross the BBB, correct.
    - 5y ago
scythe 5y ago
>Kratom can be used to treat or replace alcohol, cocaine and opiate addiction. This is a strange claim. Kratom alkaloids appear to be opioid receptor partial agonists [1]. De-escalation from opioids to kratom makes sense. Cocaine and alcohol addiction usually do not require "maintenance" post-rehab [2,3], unlike opioid dependence which is highly persistent [4], and this seems to muddy the story of a promising treatment [5] (it may compete favorably with buspirone and methadone) by mixing in stories of polydrug users who switched from cocaine to kratom. I think kratom deserves further investigation not because it is so miraculous but because the options for effective management of opioid use disorder are extremely limited, so I would think defenses of kratom should focus on this application in particular. It is certainly much less deadly than true opioids. 1: https://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/376/3/410.abstract https://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/376/3/410.abstract 2: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abstract/206441 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abst... 3: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0376871603001674 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037687160... 4: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140673698053562 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014067369... 5: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40122-020-00151-x https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40122-020-00151-x
- irthomasthomas 5y ago
  Yep, addiction is a complex subject that we still know very little about. I recommend reading the study I linked to. And check out the kratom forums to read many personal accounts from people using kratom to quit alcohol, cocaine, heroine and more. Thanks.
parineum 5y ago
>It is a herb harvested from the leaves of a tree As opposed to heroin and cocaine right?
- acchow 5y ago
  To clarify for other users, heroin doesn’t come from nature: that’s morphine. We then take morphine and put it through a chemical reaction. And cocaine? Why is cocaine worse than alcohol?

tomato-sauce 5y ago

Thanks for pointing this out. I don’t know enough about kratom to have an opinion on how it should be regulated. I will add a comment though. Just because I am fundamentally opposed to America regulating drug use outside of its territory.

fsckboy 5y ago
https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom
- Texaner 5y ago
  I will assume anything written under such a link to be false unless proven otherwise.

gunshai 5y ago

Come to Oregon where we just decriminalized the party.

loeg 5y ago

Kratom is fundamentally an opioid. It happens to be cheap and relatively safe (consumed by ingesting large quantities of plant matter, rather than injection or insufflation of some extremely potent compound). I think opioids are over-vilified in general, and I'm on the side of legalization, but kratom isn't magic.

jfk13 5y ago

I'm not familiar with that "awesome herb", so I wondered what other sources might have to say. While the numbers are small (unsurprisingly, if it's not nearly as widely known and used as some other substances), it may not be quite as innocuous as you seem to imply: > "A 2019 paper analyzing data from the National Poison Data System found that between 2011-2017 there were 11 deaths associated with kratom exposure. Nine of the 11 deaths reported in this study involved kratom plus other drugs and medicines, such as diphenhydramine (an antihistamine), alcohol, caffeine, benzodiazepines, fentanyl, and cocaine. Two deaths were reported following exposure from kratom alone with no other reported substances." > "In 2017, the FDA identified at least 44 deaths related to kratom, with at least one case investigated as possible use of pure kratom." (https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/kratom) Actually, even the study you linked has some disturbing statements: > Deaths attributed to the use of Kratom have been reported in Europe and the United States but not in Southeast Asia. > The increasing trend in Kratom consumption in the West has corresponded with an increase in reports of Kratom-related exposures to Poison Control Centers in the United States, care received at a health care facility due to Kratom consumption, and association with overdose fatalities. > Kratom was identified as the cause of death by a medical examiner in 91 of the 152 Kratom-positive deaths, but was the only identified substance in just seven of these cases.

ctoth 5y ago
This is the most reefer madness comment I have ever seen on Hacker News. Seven possible deaths with just Kratom and this justifies banning it? How many deaths and ruined lives will those enforcing a Kratom ban be responsible for? Perhaps we should consult the history of bans of other drugs to get some idea. Anyone claiming that their reason for adding yet another substance to The Forever War on Drugs is harm reduction should be laughed out of the room at this point. I reckon that, because the Covid vaccine has been responsible for at least ten blood clots we should also set up a global ban to ensure nobody ever gets to take it.
- jfk13 5y ago
  If you're going to label scientific papers you don't like as a "wall of FUD" [edit: I see you've decided to remove this remark], I'm not sure there's much we can discuss further. I didn't say it should be banned. Or that it shouldn't. I don't know enough to form an opinion on the question. I just wondered how balanced and objective the post from irthomasthomas was, did a quick search for other points of view, and felt it was worth offering some additional comments for consideration.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

Please don’t glorify Kratom as some sort of miracle herb without downsides. Kratom is an opioid, full stop. People are under the mistaken impression that it’s less addictive because it’s less potent on a per-gram basis, but addicts simply end up consuming more grams to get similar highs. It’s not a “mood regulator” in any magical sense other than it’s an opioid and opioids temporarily put people in good moods. There are many communities dedicated to quitting Kratom and handling Kratom withdrawal, which is the same as withdrawing from other opioids (For instance: https://www.reddit.com/r/quittingkratom/ https://www.reddit.com/r/quittingkratom/ ). Whether or not you think Kratom should be legal, we shouldn’t be glorifying it as a harmless substance that somehow defies the realities of every other opioid.

drooogs 5y ago
opioids are a large class of drugs with widely varying effects and potential for abuse. for instance, the active ingredient in Imodium is an opioid, but you don't see a lot of recreational Imodium users. kratom is certainly not a miracle herb, but its characteristics do make it a lot less addictive and lethal than its more popular relatives. it's not unreasonable to think it might be used in replacement therapy, similar to buprenorphine.
- LordDragonfang 5y ago
  Using Imodium as an example really hurts your case here. Loperamide (Imodium's active ingredient) isn't used recreationally because it's not psychoactive - or more accurately, it doesn't cross the blood-brain barrier. Meanwhile, you'd be hard pressed to find an opioid which does (as kratom obviously does) that lacks recreational users.
  - netizen-936824 5y ago
    Occasionally people with opioid addictions actually do use loperamide at high doses to stave off withdrawals. But it does not have the same effects as ones that cross the BBB, correct.
  - 5y ago

scythe 5y ago

>Kratom can be used to treat or replace alcohol, cocaine and opiate addiction. This is a strange claim. Kratom alkaloids appear to be opioid receptor partial agonists [1]. De-escalation from opioids to kratom makes sense. Cocaine and alcohol addiction usually do not require "maintenance" post-rehab [2,3], unlike opioid dependence which is highly persistent [4], and this seems to muddy the story of a promising treatment [5] (it may compete favorably with buspirone and methadone) by mixing in stories of polydrug users who switched from cocaine to kratom. I think kratom deserves further investigation not because it is so miraculous but because the options for effective management of opioid use disorder are extremely limited, so I would think defenses of kratom should focus on this application in particular. It is certainly much less deadly than true opioids. 1: https://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/376/3/410.abstract https://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/376/3/410.abstract 2: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abstract/206441 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abst... 3: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0376871603001674 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037687160... 4: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140673698053562 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014067369... 5: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40122-020-00151-x https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40122-020-00151-x

irthomasthomas 5y ago
Yep, addiction is a complex subject that we still know very little about. I recommend reading the study I linked to. And check out the kratom forums to read many personal accounts from people using kratom to quit alcohol, cocaine, heroine and more. Thanks.

parineum 5y ago

>It is a herb harvested from the leaves of a tree As opposed to heroin and cocaine right?

acchow 5y ago
To clarify for other users, heroin doesn’t come from nature: that’s morphine. We then take morphine and put it through a chemical reaction. And cocaine? Why is cocaine worse than alcohol?