Story thread · 2 reports / 2 sources

The drug you keep seeing at vape shops has a dark side

theblaze.com · 3h · first reportShare

Kratom products are advertised everywhere — at gas stations, smoke shops, and vape stores — but comedian and filmmaker Davey Jackson believes the rapidly growing industry deserves far more scrutiny. In a new documentary, Jackson examines how concentrated kratom extracts and synthetic derivatives have transformed a once-obscure plant into a multibillion-dollar industry. “There’s basically three categories. There’s natural powder leaf kratom, which a lot of people use and have used successfully for, you know, a lot of years. And then there’s a slightly newer product, and it’s an extract,” Jackson tells BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales. “So they’re basically extracting and concentrating the kratom into these drinks ... which that’s a whole other story. And then they have these synthetic products like 7-OH or MGM-15 or MGM-16 that the DEA is in the process of banning right now,” he explains. Gonzales points out that “there’s big money in the industry,” referencing the company Feel Free. “That’s