A wave of negative media coverage (more than usual) has engulfed kratom in the weeks following the FDA’s July 29 recommendation to classify 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH) as an illicit substance. While the agency’s move targets products containing an abundance of 7-OH—not the plain leaf kratom that contains near-zero amounts of 7-OH—news outlets have blurred the distinction, fueling confusion of those outside the kratom industry and consumer advocacy spaces. Headlines across local and national platforms are amplifying concerns about kratom that have simmered for years but gained new urgency amid federal scrutiny.
On August 10, a headline from Cowboy State Daily in Wyoming called kratom “gas station heroin”. This term was previously assigned to tianeptine, an antidepressant and mu-opioid receptor agonist illegal in many states, rather than the traditionally consumed tea from Southeast Asia. The article also called kratom “street legal morphine”, perhaps confused from the term “legal morphine” that one scientist used to describe 7-OH. The article did describe 7-OH as a derivative of kratom, but also quoted a police Lieutenant that suggested kratom was causing impaired driving without differentiating the two different compounds. It also quoted the Wyoming Health Department, which claimed 19 kratom fatalities since 2020.
The New York Post directly conflated kratom and 7-OH with the August 6th headline “RFK Jr. launches crackdown on kratom — the ‘legal morphine’ substance often found in smoke shop products”, and described kratom as being “Extracted from leaves of an evergreen tree” instead of being the leaves themselves.
The U.S. Sun also conflated kratom and 7-OH directly in the August 8th headline, “FDA CRACKDOWN: Warning over gas station drink dubbed ‘legal morphine’ after popular ‘energy booster is linked to at least two deaths'”, though the article explains the difference several paragraphs down in reporting on the FDA announcement.
Charlottesville, Virginia’s 29News ran a piece entirely on 7-OH under the headline “Blue Ridge Poison Center raises concerns about kratom“.
Alabama media, always a wealth of far-out kratom disinformation, this time made an unintentional point about the harm-producing results of kratom prohibition. In an August 9th article headlined “Deceptive drug kratom leaves Alabama users battling severe addiction, withdrawal”, WVTM 13 said “Kratom is illegal in Alabama, but [religious rehab operative Frank] Long said manufacturers have created synthetic versions, and by changing just one molecule, they can skirt the law and sell the products here.”
We have no information manufacturers have been isolating alkaloids, or “changing one molecule”, from kratom, but this highlights the iron law of prohibition: newer, stronger, untested analogues will appear as the older, more traditional, and more studied substances are wiped out due to prohibition.
What looks like a targeted media campaign against Feel Free products seems to be a major contributor to the recent wave of negative kratom news. Feel Free drinks are 2-ounce blue bottles containing both kratom and kava, two traditional teas that can cause dependency, but may carry an unknown risk if combined. Feel Free drinks are produced by the company Botanic Tonics, who are major funders of the Global Kratom Coalition (GKC). A 2023 lawsuit accused Botanic Tonics of marketing the product without proper labeling of ingredients and warnings for addiction risk.
Pieces in the Independent, Fast Company, CBS News and NBC News all ran stories featuring testimonies from consumers who claim they had bad experiences specifically with Feel Free products. All of the stories focused on kratom as the problem ingredient.
Botanic Tonics has had public disputes with the American Kratom Association (AKA), including a dropped lawsuit filed in 2024 against the AKA and it’s senior fellow on public policy Mac Haddow. Feel Free products were banned in Utah in 2024. Haddow is a former staffer of Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, who was a significant figure in the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) of 1994. Utah remains a hub of the dietary supplements industry.
OPMS, a major contributor to the AKA, has been sued multiple times for wrongful death. OPMS makes extremely strong concentrated kratom alkaloid extract products that have been marketed in similar bottles as 5-Hour Energy drinks.
The two organizations have been accused of being fronts for the big kratom industry.
It’s unknown what impact the recent surge in negative news will have on kratom, the tea leaf, but at least one city has already leaned toward prohibition. One week after the FDA’s announcement, councilmembers from Toledo, Ohio announced moves to ban kratom in the city’s limits, and also to urge the Ohio Board of Pharmacy to place kratom on Schedule 1, which the board tried to do in 2018.