As Fentanyl Sweeps Nation Is This Herbal Product Fueling The US’ Next Big Addiction Crisis?

As fewer Americans overdose from fentanyl, a new drug is taking the country by storm.

Kratom is an herbal substance derived from a plant found in Southeast Asia, Yale Medicine reported. While proponents have claimed kratom can bolster user’s moods and energy levels, experts warned the Daily Caller News Foundation that some kratom-related products can potentially lead to addiction, withdrawal symptoms and even overdose.

“It [kratom] is becoming more widespread both in reports of exposures and in sales,” Dr. Chris Holstege, a medical toxicologist at the University of Virginia (UVA) School of Medicine, told the DCNF. “During the past 11 years, U.S. poison centers received a total of 14,449 kratom exposure reports; the record high 3,434 reports in 2025 represent an increase of approximately 1,200% compared with the 258 reports in 2015. The number of calls in 2026 to U.S. poison centers have already surpassed the total number of exposures in 2025. This rapid increase in exposures is consistent with U.S. record kratom import volumes.”

“Kratom is an opioid and can have central nervous system depressive effects like other opioids, causing sedation, respiratory depression and death depending on the dose taken and depending on what other substances are taken with kratom,” Holstege continued. “Like other opioids, it can cause addiction to occur in those who use it chronically and there is a potential of withdrawal symptoms if chronic use is stopped.”

Kratom is currently legal in almost all U.S. states and is not federally regulated, per the University of Utah Health. Kratom also contains psychoactive compounds that interact with opioid receptors, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The Trump administration has been cracking down on illicit opioids such as fentanyl in recent months. In 2025, there were 69,973 estimated drug overdose deaths in the U.S., marking a decrease of nearly 14% from the 81,313 deaths estimated in 2024, the CDC reported in May.

Meanwhile, total overdose deaths involving opioids dropped from 55,296 in 2024 to 44,564 in 2025, according to the CDC’s estimates.

“There is concern for the emergence of new products with even greater concentration or greater potency than the active ingredients found naturally within the kratom plant,” Holstege explained. “These products place the public at growing risk of overdose, addiction and death. There are also products emerging in drink form and being marketed to youth as an alcohol alternative, [and] these products are being found with increasing frequency in convenience stores and vape shops around our university campus.”

Moreover, 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH) is an opioid-like chemical found in the kratom plant that can cause major health issues at high concentrations, per the Texas Department of State Health Services. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has previously referred to 7-OH as an “emerging opioid threat.”

Still, the FDA notably suggested in an Aug. 20, 2025 X post that 7-OH products may drive “the fourth wave of the opioid epidemic” in the U.S.

“The next potential phase of the opioid crisis may be defined by the emergence of novel synthetic opioids like 7-OH, combined with an increasing [prevalence] of concurrent use of opioids and other controlled substances,” according to the FDA.

Phone calls to U.S. poison centers related to kratom rose more than 1,200% between 2015 and 2025, alongside a corresponding increase in hospitalizations, according to a UVA Health analysis published in March. There were also a record-high 3,434 kratom-related deaths reported to poison centers in 2025 alone, marking a significant jump from just 258 in 2015, the research shows.

“In [a kratom-related] overdose, patients may develop opioid toxicity including slow or arrested breathing and may become comatose,” Washington Poison Center chief clinical officer Jimmy Leonard told the DCNF. “There are some cases of people with severe liver injury as well.”

“We have seen significant increases in the number of calls to poison centers about kratom since early 2025,” Leonard added. “Increased calls may be related to increasing use, media coverage, worsening toxicity, or some other unknown reason. We have had cases of young children [requiring] naloxone after exploratory ingestion of 7-OH. We’ve seen a global increase in the number of cases due to withdrawal, but the proportion is relatively steady.”

Various kratom and 7-OH products have become widely available in smoke shops, vape shops, gas stations and convenience stores across the nation in recent years, according to Michigan Medicine. Kratom products are available in a spate of forms, including teas, powders, capsules and gummies, according to Ventura County Public Health.

In December 2025, the FDA announced that the U.S. Marshals Service had seized 73,000 units of 7-OH products — worth about $1 million — from three Missouri-based firms as part of a broader effort to “protect American consumers.”

The U.S. Marshals Service did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

Some lawmakers have recently issued public warnings about the potential dangers of using kratom products. Democratic Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey issued an emergency order in August restricting the sale of kratom across her state in an attempt to “get dangerous products off store shelves.”

Moreover, Republican Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds claimed in a Tuesday statement that kratom “is not a supplement, it is not a medicine, and it is not safe.”