This is an abomination. Schedule I, for a plant that is far less addictive and harmful that traditional opioids, and is used in treatment for opioids, while the country is in the midst of a full blown opioid addiction crisis? Sounds about right. Let's put some more people in jail. That'll solve the problem.
If additional proof was needed that the DEA is at a complete disconnect from reality, this would be it.
The MDMA scheduling decision should have put any doubts about the role of the DEA to bed back in the 80s. For those unfamiliar with the history, MDMA was used by hundreds of therapists for treating patients in the 80s. Unfortunately it also led to abuse when people realized how fun it was and that they could legally mail order it in bulk. It led to too much bad press when teenagers overdosed, so the DEA stepped in.
The DEA held a hearing for the scheduling decision, and their argument for schedule 1 was that it had no medical value because no pharmaceutical company had applied for an FDA license for it. The judge ruled that MDMA didn't meet a single criteria for schedule 1 status, and the argument about FDA licensing was secondary to whether or not the medical community at large thought it was useful.
Despite this ruling, the DEA unilaterally made it schedule 1. They were sued by a Harvard psychiatrist, and the DEA lost again, with the court ruling that the drug only met the standard for schedule 3. Again, the DEA summarily dismissed the court's ruling and rescheduled it as schedule 1.
The crux of the issue that this whole process danced around was that MDMA's patent had expired, and no pharmaceutical company was going to take on the FDA costs to make a drug that was dirt cheap, easy to manufacture, and should only be used at most five times throughout a patient's life. Especially when the alternatives (Prozac and SSRIs) were making a billion dollars plus annually.
Veterans in the US have a nickname for PTSD: Paid Till Suicide or Death. Right now drug companies are treating the VA as a huge cash cow and are dumping vast quantities of opiates and in-patent SSRIs on it, when there is a far more effective treatment that is extremely cheap. It's a multi billion dollar scam that's killing people, and the DEA is purposefully helping them maintain this charade.
> for a plant that is far less addictive and harmful that traditional opioids
Interestingly enough, the related links at the bottom of the article point to another article from the same site: "Poison control centers are getting a surge of calls about ‘natural’ painkiller kratom"
What is your point? I didn't say Kratom is harmless. All drugs can cause harm and all drugs have the potential for abuse.
What I said was that Kratom is far less addictive and dangerous that typical opioids. A Kratom overdose is most likely to result in nausea and stomach irritation, not in death, and quitting a daily Kratom addition is far easier than quitting a daily oxy habit.
The article you said linked there were a few hundred calls to poison control centers around the nation during a year. Just last week, 174 people overdosed on heroin derivatives in Akron, Ohio in six days. Twenty one people died. Ohio's Governor just declared a medical emergency in the state the epidemic has gotten so bad.
260 calls in one year for kratom while 48k people call poison contol every year for overdoses of over the counter vitamins. i want to see the dea explian this decision to a judge. the aburdly low number of medical issues caused by the substance that they site is a great argument against scheduling it at all.
The pattern I've sensed is that for most drugs, one death or injury is too much. However for alcohol, cigarettes, prescription drugs, motorcycles, even peanuts for those who are allergic - hey, that's life.
