JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Patti Wheeler had never heard of kratom until she found her 27-year-old son using it \u2014 just weeks before he died.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe said, \u2018Oh, it\u2019s kratom, mom, and it\u2019s fine. It\u2019s just an herbal supplement,\u2019\u201d Wheeler recalled. But the packaging gave her pause. \u201cIt looked really like a legitimate herbal supplement,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Robert \u201cWyatt\u201d Wheeler died Oct. 25, 2022, after taking kratom. His twin brother, Gannon, found him in their Texas home, suffering a seizure.<\/p>\n
Now, his mother is on a mission to make sure other families don\u2019t get the same phone call she did.<\/p>\n
What is kratom \u2014 and why is it so easy to get?<\/p>\n
Kratom is derived from a tree native to Southeast Asia. The compounds in its leaves can have a stimulant or sedative effect on the human body, depending on the dosage used. People take kratom for many reasons: to ease pain, anxiety and depression. Some use it to help withdraw from opioids. Wyatt Wheeler was using it as a substitute for alcohol, his mother said.<\/p>\n
Getting kratom is easy. It\u2019s sold at gas stations, smoke shops and online to anyone 21 and older.<\/p>\n
Over the years, suppliers have concentrated kratom\u2019s potency significantly. Two of the plant\u2019s psychoactive compounds \u2014 mitragynine and 7-hydroxy-mitragynine, known as 7-OH \u2014 have been hyper-concentrated and, according to medical experts, are now highly addictive.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce they found out that it was really psychoactive and it could be very inexpensively extracted and then boosted synthetically, it became the big product \u2014 and it\u2019s beautifully marketed,\u201d said Susan Pitman, founder of the drug prevention group Drug Free Duval. \u201cYou can see things that say \u2018stress-releaser,\u2019 \u2018sleep well.\u2019 There are tinctures, there are pills.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pitman founded Drug Free Duval nearly 20 years ago. She calls kratom \u201ca really sneaky and dangerous substance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Florida deaths linked to kratom compound<\/p>\n
No federal agency fully regulates kratom, which means consumers may not understand how much they\u2019re taking or how it could interact with other medications.<\/p>\n
According to records obtained by the News4JAX I-Team from the Florida Medical Examiner\u2019s Commission, 131 people died in Florida in 2024 because of mitragynine \u2014 a kratom compound. Another 93 people had it in their bodies at the time of death. The 2024 report is the most recent on file.<\/p>\n
Last year, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier declared an emergency authorization calling for penalties if suppliers and merchandisers did not properly label kratom products. That emergency action expires at the end of June.<\/p>\n
A mother, a documentary and a call to ban kratom<\/p>\n
Out of her grief, Wheeler created a documentary \u2014 \u201cKratom: Side Effects May Include\u201d \u2014 that tells the stories of those who have died, examines key players in the kratom industry and looks at regulatory gaps surrounding the plant.<\/p>\n