Kratom Deaths Mount in Georgia Weeks After Ole Miss Tragedy
Both Ole Miss students had kratom compounds in their blood, and Grassley and FDPS are pushing to ban every form of kratom.
Kratom deaths are piling up in Georgia. The Georgia Poison Center has logged 315 calls and four deaths tied to kratom and kratom-like products so far this year, its director told WSB-TV on Wednesday.
“This year alone, we are already at 315 calls, and we have already had four deaths. This has been alarming,” said Dr. Gaylord Lopez, the center’s director.
Lopez said eight out of every 10 calls involve a patient hospitalized for an overdose. “These people can end up dying because they stop breathing,” he said.
Kratom deaths at Ole Miss
The warning comes weeks after two University of Mississippi students died on Sept. 21. Robert Strang, 20, was a junior from Atlanta. Aidan Hamilton, 18, was a freshman from Colorado. Investigators recovered packaged kratom from a retail store at both scenes.
Both students had mitragynine, MGM-15 and MGPI in their blood, according to toxicology results cited in a federal court filing, Fox News reported. Mitragynine is the main compound in the natural kratom leaf. MGM-15 and MGPI are kratom-derived opioids that federal law lists as Schedule I controlled substances.
Investigators also found all three substances in Smax Mango Breeze pills the students had. “There is also probable cause to believe these drugs caused two overdose deaths in Oxford, Mississippi,” the filing states. Officials have not yet released a final cause of death for either student.
At an Oct. 9 hearing, a defense attorney for two smoke shop workers said one student died of inhalation asphyxiation. The other died from a combination of substances, including cough syrup. Both workers face federal drug charges.
“These are drugs being put on the market to basically harm and even kill our children,” Lopez said.
Calls to ban all kratom
The deaths have fueled calls to pull every form of kratom off the market, not just the lab-made versions.
“All Kratom is deadly it should NOT be sold at gas stations/vape stores/ANYWHERE,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) wrote on X on Oct. 2. Five days later, he joined Susan Collins in asking DEA and FDA to schedule the entire kratom plant.
The Foundation for Drug Policy Solutions (FDPS), a national drug policy group, ran a television ad urging President Trump and Congress to outlaw kratom in every form. The ad argues that the body converts mitragynine, the leaf’s main compound, into 7-OH. Banning only concentrated 7-OH, it says, “leaves the addictive drug on the shelf.” Its tagline: “Saturdays should be about football, not funerals.”
Washington moves the other way
The kratom plant remains legal under federal law. DEA’s July plan to temporarily schedule 7-OH never took effect. Then on Oct. 9, the Justice Department loosened the 7-OH ban, doubling the amount gas stations can legally sell.
“This summer the government was ready to ban these drugs. Today it’s bowing to industry lobbyists,” FDPS president Dr. Kevin Sabet said after the decision.
Even where bans exist, enforcement lags. Synthetic kratom is illegal in Georgia, yet gas stations and smoke shops still sell it widely, WSB-TV reports.
Nationally, CDC data tie kratom to at least 5,208 overdose deaths from 2020 to 2024.
In Georgia alone, the poison center has already counted four kratom deaths, and the year is not over.
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