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The blowback against the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's decision to ban kratom has caught the attention of a bipartisan group of legislators, but a DEA spokesman has said that "It's not a matter of if. It's simply a matter of when" the DEA bans kratom:
A bipartisan group of nine senators is calling on the Drug Enforcement Administration to delay its "unprecedented" decision to ban kratom, a plant that researchers say holds great potential for mitigating the effects of the opioid epidemic. [...] The Senate letter, spearheaded by Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) says: "Congress granted emergency scheduling authority to the DEA based on the need for law enforcement interdiction of new and previously unknown illegal synthetic street drugs that result in injuries and death. The use of this emergency authority for a natural substance is unprecedented, so it is important to determine whether the circumstances here necessitate a jump to Schedule I.
"Given the long reported history of Kratom use," the letter continues, "coupled with the public's sentiment that it is a safe alternative to prescription opioids, we believe using the regular review process would provide for a much-needed discussion among all stakeholders." [...] The DEA cites 600-plus poison-control center calls involving kratom between 2010 and 2015 in its justification for banning the plant, and notes that 15 deaths were linked to the use of the plant between 2014 and 2016. In an interview with The Washington Post, a DEA spokesman later clarified that all but one of those fatalities involved the use of other substances. Earlier this week 51 U.S. representatives similarly called on the DEA and the White House to reconsider or at least delay the ban, which was slated to go into effect as early as Friday. In an interview, DEA spokesman Russell Baer confirmed that the ban was not yet in place. "We have not yet determined a date when we will publish that final order" putting the ban into effect, he said.
There may be a public comment period before the ban takes effect, and the White House is now obligated to respond to the petition about kratom, which has reached over 140,000 signatures.
Text of the Senators' letter. Also at Ars Technica, CBS, and US News & World Report.
Previously: DEA Welcomes Kratom to the Schedule I List Beginning September 30
Heroin, Fentanyl? Meh: Carfentanil is the Latest Killer Opioid
Alcohol Industry Bankrolls Fight Against Legal Pot in Battle of the Buzz [Updated]
(Score: 2) by tathra on Sunday October 02 2016, @12:57AM
600 poison control center calls in 5 years and a mere 15 deaths in 2 years? thats several orders of magnitude safer than tylenol, and tens or hundreds of orders of magnitude safer than alcohol. why aren't those being banned, considering they're both significantly more dangerous and toxic than kratom? or mdma, or psylocibin, or mescaline, or lsd, etc. fucking pieces of shit don't give a shit about public safety or saving lives, their entire fucking job is to destroy lives and shred the constitution. its surprising to see so much of congress speaking up though. past examples prove that no matter how much medical evidence is provided, once the DEA decides to put something on schedule 1 nothign will change their minds period (see mdma for a prominent example), but if anyone can stop these haters of freedom and human rights, its the people who can shut down their whole agency, congress.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 02 2016, @02:28AM
I don't even know where in the Constitution the federal government is granted the authority to arbitrarily ban drugs, let alone without a specific act of congress! The commerce clause was never designed to give the government power over all interstate commerce (Let alone activities that take place entirely within one state and might not even be commerce at all!), but to stop states from interfering with the interstate commerce of other states. There's nowhere in the Constitution that says that congress can cede its lawmaking powers to the agencies it creates, either, so this is truly a bizarre situation. The government is violating the highest law of the land on a massive scale, and many normal people I talk to about this scoff at the idea that the government's actions are unconstitutional. We've had entire generations of people believing that the notion that the federal government only has the powers specifically given to it by the Constitution is now somehow null and void.