The DEA's Crazy Kratom Ban Dresses Pharmacological Phobia In Scientific Garb

[G_j]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2016/09/01/the-deas-crazy-kratom-ban-dresses-pharmacological-phobias-in-scientific-garb/#1e7e72c04f86

At the end of this month, kratom will be illegal throughout the United States thanks to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which this week announced that a ban is necessary “to avoid an imminent hazard to public safety.” The way the DEA reached that conclusion provides an illuminating window on the prohibitionist mindset, which dresses pharmacological phobias in the garb of science.

Kratom is a pain-relieving leaf that acts as a stimulant or a sedative, depending on the dose. But the most important thing to know about kratom, if you want to understand the DEA’s reasoning, is that it’s not from here. Kratom comes from a tree, Mitragyna speciosa, that is native to Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Myanmar, and Papua New Guinea. It has gained a following in the United States only recently, hawked by online merchants and head shops as an herbal medicine, “dietary supplement,” or legal high. As far as the DEA is concerned, the fact that people in other countries have used kratom for centuries to ease pain, boost work performance, and wean themselves from opiate addiction counts for nothing. All the DEA needs to know is that our shores have been invaded by a foreign drug that is increasingly popular among Americans as a home remedy and recreational intoxicant. From the DEA’s perspective, that is intolerable, regardless of the drug’s hazards or benefits.

If you think I’m exaggerating, consider how the DEA decided that kratom meets the criteria for “temporary” placement in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, the law’s most restrictive category. The DEA has at least two years to make that designation permanent, which it almost certainly will do after going through a somewhat more elaborate process of bureaucratic self-justification. For the time being, it need only consider three factors: “the substance’s history and current pattern of abuse; the scope, duration and significance of abuse; and what, if any, risk there is to the public health.”

...more...

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Get high? Must be bad. Up next, banning Welsh Rarebit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_rarebit



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_of_the_Rarebit_Fiend

[Richard D]

3. So many people are . . .

. . . using this to get off of opiate addiction. It's really criminal that this has been put on Schedule 1.

[awoke_in_2003]

8. Opiates make big money for pharma. nt

[Warren DeMontague]

4. Because well-connected corporations sell it?

[NutmegYankee]

5. It has an accepted medical use, so it's schedule II.

I realize that some drugs could have a medical use that are schedule I, but police need their armored vehicles and shit...

[awoke_in_2003]

9. It's profitable. nt

[Odin2005]

6. The DEA is a rogue agency full of genuine Prohibitionist True Believers.

A few months ago I was watching a show on NatGeo about the Border Patrol on the Mexican border and they had one episode where they they found a bunch of Mexican brick weed and handed it over to the DEA for "destruction" at some super-fancy facility. The way the DEA people on the show talked about the confiscated weed made it obvious that these people are brainwashed fanatics who genuinely think the stuff is somehow extremely dangerous.

These aren't cynics lying for some corporate lobby, they really believe the stupidity they spew.

[independentpiney]

7. Please sign this petition

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/please-do-not-make-kratom-schedule-i-substance
I've tried, and didn't care for kratom. The taste is horrid no matter how it's prepared. But I've got a family member who have used it successfully to control opiate addiction. They're panicked over what to do when their supplies run out. This ban is going to kill people who turn to fentanyl analogs or revert to heroin.