Today, Explained - Gas station opioids

Episode Date: October 2, 2026

Drugs like kratom and 7-OH are widely available at corner stores and smoke shops. They've remained largely unregulated until now. This episode was produced by Kelli Wessinger, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Gabriel Dunatov, engineered by David Tatasciore and Bridger Dunnagan, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Capsules of the herbal supplement Kratom, a psychoactive drug derived from the leaves of the kratom plant. Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast⁠.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, explain from Vox, Sean Ramos from Vox. You ever go into a gas station and you're paying at the counter and you look behind the clerk and there's a bunch of cigarettes? But then next to the cigarettes are a bunch of zany products with even zanier names and you're like, what are those? Wait, I have to go my kids in the car. Right now in Northern Virginia, we're here to find out what are those? Everything we handle, they go around the same components from the Kratum. One of them is the Super K. It is a beverage. It's mostly made of collision water. It has another alcohol levels.

Opiums is another brand people usually trust. They usually try to make different components. I mean like a strawberry, grape, bubble gum. Some of these products are colloquially known as gas station heroin. And on the show today, we're going to ask, how is that legal? Hey, it's Sue Bird. I'm back this week with a brand new episode of Bird's Eye View. joined by Portland Fire head coach Alex Serama to discuss bringing his unique coaching style to the WMBA and channeling this year's momentum into the fires next season. But first, Coach Sarama and I break down the action from round one of the playoffs. Make sure to check out Bird's Eye View on

YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Megan Rapino here. This week on Why Are You Like This, I am talking with Jaden Shaw. We're diving into the highs, the lows, the unexpected turns, the Gotham Midfielder has gone through in her career. I'm also weighing in on the latest USW&T roster to drop on their road to the World Cup next summer. Check out the latest episode of Why Are You Like This, wherever you get your podcast and on YouTube. Ready. All right. So anyone who's ever been to a gas station in the United States knows there's like a CVS level of drugs behind the counter. But two of them are making news right now because of overdoses.

and regulations. So he asked Mata Busby to join us to talk about those two. He recently wrote about them for Wired. Well, there's Kratum and then there's 70H. They're separate but related. So Kratum is, you know, from the coffee family. It's from Southeast Asia. It's a sort of dark, green, really earthy sort of powder.

And in lower doses, yeah, it's almost like matcha. but maybe a bit more euphoric. This is my favorite thing in the world for all-natural energy. It's made from plants, and it's been helping me get through my days for the past seven years. I'm almost done cleaning my kitchen, something I have been avoiding for days. Craid them, y'all.

Crate them. The energy is like a more natural type of energy to where it always keeps you at a level, right? And then at higher doses, gets even more euphoric. And I would say within about 10 minutes, I felt light as a feather. I just stared outside and watch a flock.

A birds fly away. And it was beautiful. And works like an opioid. It works on the opioid system in your brain, which is why people, you know, with such addictions, now take cratum in a lot of cases. Or they just take cratum and phantom. 0-0-0-H comes from within cratum and yeah it's like an uber potent extract that really i mean

there's not much precedent for this you know being available right now it's a very recent phenomenon you know very little research and yeah some studies suggest it's stronger than morphine that's it's strong bro like i got all lukey and It was like a trinkillizer. I just knew from the moment I had it that I would always want it. I mean, we're talking about this now because it's been in the news a bunch lately, but how long has, has Kratum been around? In the U.S., it's like a 21st century phenomenon,

like the last 20, maybe 25 years. But traditional use goes back centuries in Southeast Asia, mostly in Thailand. It's like an evergreen tree, Mitragyna, speciosa. And like traditionally people will chew like one or two leaves or brew them into a tea, like to work longer hours, relieve pain, increase energy. And so, yeah, to see it kind of morphing into powders, capsules, extract, shots, you know, if you get some like, you know, old Thai gentlemen to see all of these like products

in America, they, you know, probably either laugh or cry, right? I mean, this is widely available across this country in perhaps the most convenient place to get stuff in this country, a gas station. Have you tried it? I certainly have not. Yeah, I've actually tried to create a number of times because I don't drink alcohol, right? So whenever I'm in the US and, you know, at times I was living in Vancouver and once coming to America often, you know, when I'd be going to like a new city or somewhere on like a reporting gig. I would go to like a caver and cratum bar and, you know, like hang out if I didn't have anyone to hang out with or indeed like with a friend. You know, we just go along rather than sort of sinking pints of lager, which I've done a lot of. And yeah, just prefer not to now.

And so, yeah, these bars are a very sort of mellow vibe. How big is the industry, do we now? I mean, it's a multi-billion dollar industry. I think, you know, a couple billion. it's worth. Like, you think about it, right? It's in like hundreds, you know, thousands of gas stations, like corner stores, bodegas,

and there's all of these different brands, and, you know, they're selling it in all sorts of formulas from gummies to tea bags to pills to sort of little shots. And then there's Feel Free, which is this most well-known brand, which is like a mix of cover. and Kratom. How is it being marketed?

I mean, famously, opioids have got a bit of a bad rap in this country, but it sounds like Kratum is sneaking in under the radar. Yeah, I mean, it's been coming up for like 20 years, right? And the DEA tried to or proposed a ban in 2016, but folks, like, mobilized with the help of Cory Brooker and Bernie Sanders to, yeah, beat the DEA down. And so, you know, I don't know if it's really snucking under the radar, but it's definitely like in the zeitgeist.

It's in the news. And for good reason, I mean, to have these 70H gummies just in, like, gas stations is a really, you know, potentially problematic thing. They look like fruit-flavored pills, sugary gummies, and imitation ice cream cones. But these products contain a chemical compound commonly known as 708. The real danger is the disguise. Doctors at TGH warned that it's deliberately packaged to hide its dangers behind fruit flavors and botanical labels.

And federal regulators say it can be up to 13 times stronger than morphine. You know, without the drug education alongside it, you know, this drug is just popped up out of nowhere. And it does seem that these, you know, University of Mississippi students, the other day, you know, may have been taking 70H. The University of Mississippi identifying the two students who died on Monday, identified as Robert Strang from Atlanta, and the other student is Aiden Hamilton from Colorado. At one scene, police found a cratom-like substance near Aden Hamilton.

Just an hour later, they found tablets from the same brand near student Robert Strain. And we're expecting talks reports in the coming days. police say they don't think these two deaths are connected, and we still don't know if Kratum contributed to their deaths. So, yeah, it raises serious questions. Yes, right. These students are part of the reason we wanted to speak to you about this substance today, because it seems like people may be taking too much of it and may be overdosing or even worse.

Well, in the early reporting of these tragic deaths, you know, they were saying that investigators and found Kratum on the scene. But now it seems like it was, you know, 7-O-H. There have been, you know, other deaths related to Kratum, like Mitraginine poisoning is what they're calling it. But, I mean, if you're thinking that there's tens of thousands of overdose deaths in the US every year, and over the last 10 years,

I think there's been 233, Kratum-related deaths, and then, you know, a few dozen of those are like confirmed mitraginine poisonings. So I think when it comes to a lot of the uproar around Kratum and indeed 70H, it does strike me that it just follows in a kind of long tradition of these sorts of new and exotic drugs and their harms getting, to some extent, blown out of proportion, while, you know, far more deadly pharmaceutical drugs, you know, continue to kill people, even though they're prescribed by doctors, you know, at really frightening rates. It's just, you know, how many times can you tell that story? It gets a bit boring. Do you think a reason that Kratum is getting a lot of attention and maybe even working people into hysteria is because it's so readily available?

because a kid standing on some corner in some town could ask a stranger to buy it for them at a gas station and then who knows? Yeah, obviously when you put it like that, it sort of invokes this pretty, you know, like scary image, the sort of specter of Kratum hanging above us like the sword of Damocles. But yeah, really, it's these 70H gummies

rather than Kratum where the, the concern is, but they often get conflated. And yeah, I mean, what's the solution? Just, like, ban them and take them off the shelves. I mean, maybe wouldn't be the worst idea, but it's clearly going to sort of force the people that are using it and want to continue to use them, like, underground and potentially to more harmful substances or formulations of the same substance. So, yeah, it's immensely kind of complicated. You know, if you're a person that advocates for drug policy reform. Like, you know, what do you do next?

But yeah, I think they definitely need to do some studies, maybe take it off the shelves until they've got more robust evidence and can actually provide some proper dosing information on the packets. I'll tell you what, why don't we take a breath here and when we come back on Today Explained, we'll talk about all the solutions that are on the table. Okay. Support for today Explained comes from Ship Station.

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They shop, you save. I was on this discussion about Kratom. Are you familiar with this? I'm on it right now. Oh, wow. Now I get why people might think it's a drug. What is a drug? Yeah, for sure.

Today, Explain is back, and we're going to talk more about 70H with Matha. First off, is there an important distinction between Kratum and 70H? and is 70H found in Cratum? Yeah, 7.OH is found in relatively small quantities within Cratum, but this businessman, Vince Sanders, who is the South-styled American shaman out of Kansas City. And she goes, well, what's another name for a medicine man? I'm like, well, another man for medicine, man.

And she's doing the same time, we're kind of back and forth. And I go, a shaman. She goes, I like, did he just lanes across the desk. like shaman. That feels good. It just feels right. Basically, you know, figured out how to extract the 70H and kind of, you know, blow it up into entire pills. I've just never seen anything move like this as we were actually doing more sales with 70H and we are all the Canada's products combined. I've never tried 70H and I'm not interested to, you know, just for the record since I've been talking about how, you know, I don't mind Cratum. But yeah, these, these 70H tablets, yeah,

are uber, uber strong. But, you know, I think, you know, the large number of people that are taking it are using it instead of opioids. And maybe it's better, maybe it's not. Is 708 something you can also easily find at your, you know, neighborhood gas station? Yeah, so it's much the same as the Cratum formulation. So, you know, you're talking like gummies, little shots, you know, capsules. And the brand names for the 70H companies are perhaps even more kind of out there. Like 70 Heaven is one. You know, it's certainly not heaven when you're going into withdrawals. And do we know that people are? Are people becoming addicted to 70H?

People are becoming addicted to cratum and 7OH. You know, I think the whole thing, the concern originally sprung up with the feel-free tonics that are like a mix of Kava and Kratum. The drink contains Kratom

and Kava and the lawsuit claims the company failed to properly warn consumers about risks of addiction, withdrawal and other possible health effects. I was addicted to this little Kava Kratum drink that works on your brain like an opiate, And they quite literally made me question my sanity. You know, one turn to two, two turn to three,

to the point that I can only do everyday tasks if I had, you know, that certain amount daily. And people just got habituated into drinking several of them per day and realized that, yeah, it's very unpleasant if they don't continue to do that on a daily basis. Okay, so you're talking about withdrawal effects. You're talking about real danger here with 70H especially. Obviously, we have a federal government that loves to police drugs of all sorts. What are they doing about 70H? You mentioned that there was some effort in the past with Kratom, but maybe it didn't work out.

What's up with 70H? Yeah, I guess it's this sort of like maha dilemma, right? Because their ethos is very sort of like natural medicines and freedom. So then the idea that this feel-free tonic that's called Feel Free and whose owner J.W. Ross recently gave, or a company related to him, recently gave like 500 grand to the Maha pack. And he's been photographed next to RFK Jr. So he's perhaps predictably come out on the side of the Kratum industry who are lobbying for a ban of 70H. RFK called it sinister. And they're marketed for children. They're gummy bears.

They're bright colors. They're candy flavored. This is really a sinister, sinister industry. Instead it targets children, which it appears to do in some cases, just with like the gummies. But there's Kratum gummies too. And clearly, like,

gummies are an easier way especially for like older people to like, you know, ingest the medicine slash substance. So, you know, we shouldn't just blame the gummies here. But yeah, clearly when you've just got packets of these gummies that are called like 70 Heaven just on the shelf or indeed, you know, behind the counter at the gas station, there's going to be concern about that. I mean, there's other, like, MAGA figures like Mark Wayne Mullen, who's the Homeland Security Secretary, who's got like a million dollar investment in the parent company of Feel Free. So there's definitely this kind of like, you know, nexus of figures in the government that have got, you know, some interest, potentially or relationships with the Kratum industry and indeed, you know, the department when I was writing my wide story.

reminded us and readers that, yeah, everything he's done is ethical, and I'm sure it has been. I mean, we usually think of, like, liberal drug policies as a lefty thing. Markway Mullins about as right as they come. Are Cratum and 70H making friends across the political spectrum because there's a big business opportunity here? People can get paid? I think that, yeah, you look at Trump's executive order on psychedelics. It's called i. Bogain treatment.

I. Bogain. Remember the name. And then, you know, rescheduling cannabis. We have people begging for me to do this. People that are in great pain. And it seems that the right has really kind of seized the mantle and, you know, looking at it from, yeah, A, like a more libertarian perspective, like, hey, what happens in a man's head is his own business.

but then also being probably more business friendly than perhaps people on the left would be. So yeah, it's a really kind of interesting moment right now, for sure, especially with RFK as Health Secretary. But Trump has spoken at length about the opioid crisis in the United States and how it's tearing our communities apart and whatnot. As you all know from personal experience, families, communities and citizens, or else our country, are currently dealing with the worst drug crisis in American history,

and even, if you really think about it, world history. Here we have readily accessible opioids at our gas stations. And you mentioned, yes, they're not killing nearly as many people as prescription drugs are. However, they're a lot easier to get than prescription drugs. So help me understand this administration's position in, relation to what could be a real terror for some people. Well, they are in the process of banning 70H. Last month, the Department of Justice set out like an emergency scheduling.

So that's open for comments at the moment, right? Like, you know, when they ban something, it doesn't just happen overnight. So yeah, that's in process. And Trump in the Oval Office earlier this year set out his support for natural 70H in kind of confusing comments that appeared to refer to Kratum. So I think, yeah, possibly by the beginning of next year, it's quite possible that these 70H products won't be in gas stations and indeed states have, some states, have already taken action. And just to get ahead of any confusion here, 7-0-H may be banned from gas stations

and probably other convenience stores, but not Kratom? Exactly, yeah. So why one and not the other? Obviously, 7.OH is stronger, as you've told us, but you could take a lot of cratum, and it might feel like taking a little 70H, no? Absolutely, yeah. I mean, you just need to take a lot, and it's in powder form. So, you know, you need to really consume a prodigious quantity of it or, you know, indeed drink a bunch of these Celsius. So I think that they're not going to ban cratum because there's an obvious recognition of the good it does for people. that are recovering from opiate addictions. Case studies and surveys suggest a tea traditionally prepared from the fresh leaves of Kratom may transition physically dependent individuals off opioids with fewer symptoms of withdrawal. Liophilized Kratum tea as a therapeutic option for opioid dependence, November 2020.

And that they do have a kind of natural off-ramp for, yeah, what is very unlikely to kill you, even though you might take a huge amount. Whereas if you're taking like 26 different medications, including a bunch of opioids for your chronic pain, yeah, you might die. And who do you think wins the argument at the end of the day? We have some strong lobbying forces involved here. You've got a lot of people who have come to enjoy or depend on these substances that are, as we've established many times now,

readily available all over the country. Do you think we see fewer or more in our gas stations and convenience stores in the years to come? I think that the Kratom advocates are obviously a lot more kind of eloquent and suited and booted than the 70H folks. Yeah, what I see is that 70H will be forced underground and that Kratum will continue its long and illustrious assent. in American culture. We do really have a gas station culture in this country. And I wonder if these substances being so available in them is like a particularly American thing. You've mentioned that you used to live in Canada, you live in the UK.

Are gas station drugs kind of like an us thing? Yeah, it's an American thing for sure. But you guys take a lot of drugs. Maita Busby wrote, The Kratum Civil War is heating up, and Maha has picked aside for Wired. Kelly Wessinger produced, Jolie Myers edited Gabriel Donotov Fax,

David Tadishore, and Bridger Dunigan mix. I'm Sean Ramsveram and everyone else. In alphabetical order is Aminal Al-Assadi, Ariana Spuru, Abishai Artsy, Danielle Hewitt, Denise Gera, Dustin DeSoto, Haryma Waghdi, Mawaddy, Miles, Brian, Miranda, Kennedy, Noel King, Patrick Boyd, Peter Balinon-Rosen, Breakmaster Cylinder is with us spiritually.

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