{"id":294077,"date":"2026-09-25T23:16:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T23:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/294077\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T23:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T23:16:09","slug":"kratom-bill-seeks-to-establish-regulations-in-pennsylvania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/294077\/","title":{"rendered":"Kratom bill seeks to establish regulations in Pennsylvania"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pennsylvania state rep to regulate kratom over health and safety concerns<\/p>\n

\"Chandi<\/a>PITTSBURGH \u2014<\/p>\n

A state representative is pushing for regulations on kratom<\/a>, a substance marketed as an energy stimulant or mood booster<\/a>, as concerns grow over its health risks and links to deaths, including at least one in Allegheny County. <\/p>\n

Rep. Dan Frankel, whose office is located on Murray Avenue in Squirrel Hill, where several businesses sell kratom, said he wants natural kratom to be regulated and synthetic versions, such as 7-OH, to be prohibited. <\/p>\n

\u201cBeing unregulated, we have no ability to control who it\u2019s being sold to, how it\u2019s being packaged, and we need to find a way to control it because we know that the impacts have been really catastrophic,\u201d Frankel said. <\/p>\n

The Pennsylvania House Health Committee is set to consider Bill 2657<\/a> next week. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt would make sure that it\u2019s not packaged in a way that is attractive to children. It would prohibit the use and acquisition of the product by anybody under the age of 21,\u201d Frankel said. <\/p>\n

Looking for more news in your area | Subscribe to the WTAE YouTube Channel<\/a><\/p>\n

Dr. Mark Guy, of Allegheny Health Network, warned about the serious health risks associated with kratom, including dependence and death. <\/p>\n

\u201cFor the last two years, we\u2019ve seen a crescendo of patients who are reaching out and asking for help coming off of the use of a substance that they\u2019ve been buying at the gas station, and most of them are surprised by the fact that they have run into withdrawal symptoms when trying to stop it,\u201d Guy said. \u201cIt is a really complicated molecule that stimulates the opioid receptor, plus a number of other receptors, and it absolutely will cause dependence, it can cause respiratory suppression and it can cause death.” <\/p>\n

One man, who asked to remain anonymous, shared that he used kratom for pain relief.<\/p>\n

\u201cI broke my foot, and after the pain meds — you know, they only give you a week, and I was still in severe pain. I used kratom as a crutch to get me through that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

However, he did not anticipate the serious effects of synthetic versions and eventually needed medical assistance. <\/p>\n

The Pennsylvania House Health Committee will review the bill on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Download the WTAE app<\/a> to stay connected with breaking news. Sign up for our email newsletters<\/a> to get breaking news in your inbox.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania state rep to regulate kratom over health and safety concerns PITTSBURGH \u2014 A state representative is pushing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[121774,111,121779,121775,121778,82456,121777,121776,2092,9997,28,30,121780,29,14251,75214,42455,72474,20266,10254],"class_list":["post-294077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-7-oh","tag-death","tag-dependence","tag-energy-stimulant","tag-health-risk","tag-kratom","tag-kratom-bill","tag-mood-booster","tag-more-news","tag-next-week","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-house-health-committee","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-regulation","tag-safety-concern","tag-substance","tag-synthetic-version","tag-use","tag-wtae"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}