For anyone familiar with the drug industry, the phrase “schedule” is essential to understand the category of the substance in a legal sense. Any discourse on anesthetics, drugs, prescriptions, and other substances is generally co schedules or classifications. 

Law administration officers and medical professionals use drug schedules to characterize a drug substance’s legitimacy. To figure out the latest and developing implications, the research on the sustainable medical use and possible dependence or abuse study of drugs. 

To find out the origin of the drug schedule in the USA, we’ve to go back to 1906. Since the endorsement of the Pure Food and Drug Act, the US has been endeavoring to control the use of drugs effectively. According to the act, any drug or food manufacturer has had to mention if it contained any threatening substances on the product’s label. 

Though this activity has gone through numerous revisions over the last six decades, the drug classifications enrolled officially with President Nixon’s approval of the CSA- Controlled Substances Act. 

Drug Schedules 

Certain chemicals, substances, and drugs that are used to manufacture drugs are organized into 5-schedules or categories as follows- 

• Schedule I– Drugs with a high possibility of abuse and no recent medical acceptance for usage.  
• Schedule II– drugs with a few medical acceptance but a high possibility of addiction or abuse and can be attained through prescription. 
• Schedule III– Comparatively less harmful than schedule I and II, and low possibility of addiction or abuse. But, these need to be through prescription. 
• Schedule IV– Drugs with the moderate potential of dependence or abuse and practical medical use. 

and of course

• Schedule V– Drugs with comparably low possibility for abuse and includes preparations consisting of a limited amount of several narcotics. 

According to the CSA, the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) and DEA got the power to decide which substance is suitable for medical use. FDA banned drug substances list is as follows-

• Nitroglycerin tablets
• Colchicine
• Morphine Sulfate and Morphine Concentrated Solution
• Phenobarbital
• Carbinoxamine
• Chloral Hydrate

Does the FDA ban Kratom?  Is Kratom a Scheduled Drug?

Due to safety concerns, in some states and countries, using Kratom is illegal. The FDA forewarns US consumers to eschew using any product that contains this substance. However in most of the US kratom is perfectly legal, without any drug scheduling by the FDA. There is no federal ban on kratom.

Mitragyna Speciosa (Kratom) naturally grows in Malaysia, Thailand, Papua New Guinea, and Indonesia. However, according to the Food and Drug Administration, Kratom contains properties that may lead users to the risk of abuse. So, they keep warning the consumers of the US to keep away from it. However, they do not actually say kratom is a scheduled substance.

The FDA has not banned kratom. Kratom does not have a drug schedule in the US currently.

Kratom Import Alert

As there are alarming reports regarding its safety, there’s no FDA approved the utilization of Kratom. Kratom was identified on an import alert in 2012 for unauthorized drugs. There was another import alert for containing bulk dietary supplements and ingredients in 2014. Following this, FDA took up several actions as follows- 

• US Marshals seized over 25,000 pounds of Kratom raw material worth more than $5 million from Rosefield Management in Van Nuys, California, in 2014. 
• In 2016, US Marshals captured almost 90,000 bottles, worth about $400,000, of dietary supplements tagged as carrying Kratom held by Dordoniz Natural Products LLC, marketed under RelaKzpro. 
• Also, in 2016, 100 cases of Kratom-labeled products marketed under Kratom therapy and distributed by Nature therapeutics LLC were seized by the US Marshals. 

Final Thoughts on Drug Scheduling

However, the FDA continues to tell consumers to stay away from using any product consisting of Kratom or its psychoactive composites 7-hydroxy mitragynine and mitragynine. Moreover, to better understand its safety issue, while combining Kratom with other medications, the FDA inspires more research on Kratom.  

We hope this blog helps you understand drug scheduling in the US, and where kratom stands legally in the US.

Check out our other blogs here!

Check out blog on if kratom is legal in your state here.

Jasmin Weber

Jasmin Weber has been working in the kratom & CBD industry for 3 years with Grassroots Harvest and GRH Kratom. She regularly writes content for both the cannabis and kratom websites of these stores & can also be found featured on related sites around the web.