Science
1,200% jump in kratom-related calls to poison control centers in last decade, analysis shows
Over the last decade, poison control centers around the country have received tens of thousands of calls from consumers of kratom products reporting adverse and life-threatening health effects, with researchers saying reports in 2025 reached a new level. California’s poison center is reporting similar findings.
Last month, researchers analyzed information from the National Poison Data System and found that between 2015 and 2025, poison control centers across the nation received 14,449 calls related to kratom. More than 23% of those calls, or 3,434, were made last year, according to a published report in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That represents a more than 1,200% increase from 2015, when only 258 calls were reported.
Officers gather illegally grown kratom plants in 2019 in Phang Nha province, Thailand. The country decriminalized the possession and sale of kratom in 2021.
(Associated Press)
Kratom is derived from the leaves of Mitragyna speciosa, a tree native to Southeast Asia. It has a long history of being used for chronic pain or to boost energy and in the U.S., research points to Americans also using it to alleviate anxiety. In low doses, kratom appears to act as a stimulant but in high doses, it can have effects more like opioids.
But in the last few years, a synthetic form of kratom refined for its psychoactive compound, 7-hydroxymitragynine or 7-OH, has entered the market that is highly concentrated and not clearly labeled, leading to confusion and problems for consumers. The synthetic form gaining momentum in the market is sparking concern among public health officials because of its ability to bind to opioid receptors in the body, causing it to have a higher potential for abuse.
Los Angeles County leaders, meanwhile, have grappled with differentiating the two and regulating the products that come in the form of powder, capsules and drinks and have been linked to six county deaths. Sales of kratom and 7-OH products were banned in the county in November.
In reviewing the data, which did not differentiate whether callers had consumed natural or synthetic kratom, researchers set out to understand the effect of what they believe is a “rapidly evolving kratom market,” and highlight the role poison centers can play as an early warning surveillance system to detect new trends.
National Poison Data System findings
The data showed that over the last 10 years, 62% of the kratom-related calls to poison control centers were from people who said they consumed the drug by itself, and the other 38% were from people who combined it with another substance or substances.
Those who consumed kratom with another substance combined it most frequently with one or a combination of the following: alcohol, opioids, benzodiazepines (like Xanax or Valium), cannabis and cannabinoids, stimulants and antidepressants.
The data also broke down hospitalizations related to kratom — adults who took it alone or in combination and experienced “adverse” health effects; and adults who took it alone or in combination and experienced more serious “moderate” or “major” health effects, including death.
Kratom powder products are displayed in a smoke shop in Los Angeles in 2024.
(Michael Blackshire/Los Angeles Times)
Hospitalizations for adults who had consumed kratom alone and experienced adverse effects increased from 43 in 2015 to 538 in 2025. For those who took it in combination and were hospitalized with an adverse health effect, the total jumped from 40 in 2015 to 549 last year.
The numbers were even higher for hospitalizations where the health effects were more serious or fatal.
In 2015, there were 76 reports of people being hospitalized after taking kratom alone and experiencing a serious health effect or dying. By last year, that number had climbed to 919. The reports of serious health effects, including death, for those who took kratom in combination with another substance grew from 51 in 2015 to 725 last year.
The research does not break down kratom-related deaths by year but states that there were 233 deaths over the 10-year study period, or just over 3% of all 7,287 serious medical outcomes. Of the total number of kratom-related deaths, 184 cases involved the consumption of multiple substances.
What California’s poison control system found in its state data
The California Poison Control System is currently reviewing its data concerning kratom-related calls but an initial analysis shows parallels to the national report, said Rais Vohra, medical director of the state poison control system.
“We have about 10% of the national population and about 10% of the national call volume with poison control,” Vohra said. “And so, not surprisingly, we were able to identify over 900 cases of calls related to kratom in that same period.”
Local researchers are still deciphering the state data but they too have found that kratom-related calls are climbing.
“It’s accelerating, which I think is one of the main points of the [published] report,” Vohra said.
A majority of calls received by poison control come from healthcare facilities where “presumably someone has a problem … severe enough to warrant calling 911 or going to the emergency room, and that’s when our agency gets involved,” Vohra said.
Kait Brown, clinical managing director for America’s Poison Control Centers, said the fact that kratom and 7-OH are federally unregulated products sold online, in gas stations and smoke shops gives people across the country easy access.
And while kratom enthusiasts maintain that it has been used in its natural form for hundreds of years, “there are new formulations that are a little bit different than how people have used it, at least historically,” said William Eggleston, a pharmacist and the assistant clinical director of the Upstate New York Poison Center in Syracuse.
People are no longer consuming kratom only as a powder or capsule but also in the form of an energy shot or extract; it’s similar for synthetic, more concentrated 7-OH products.
When regional poison centers compare their findings and experiences with the analysis of calls in the National Poison Data System, Eggleston said, “undeniably there is an increase in calls related to kratom.”
“But when you put it in the bigger perspective of all the calls … this is still a very small percentage of what we’re dealing with on a day to day basis,” he said.
Our universe might be chock-full of cosmic wonder, but you can observe only a fraction of astronomical phenomena with the naked eye. Meteor showers, natural fireworks that streak brightly across the night sky, are one of them.
The latest observable meteor shower will be the Lyrids, which has been active since April 14 and is forecast to continue through April 30. The shower reaches its peak April 21 to 22, or Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.
According to NASA, the Lyrids are one of the oldest known meteor showers, and have been enjoyed by stargazers for nearly 3,000 years. Their bright, speedy streaks are caused by the dusty debris from a comet named Thatcher. They appear to spring from the constellation Lyra, which right now can be seen in the eastern sky at night in the Northern Hemisphere.
The moon will be about 27 percent full tonight, appearing as a thick crescent in the sky, according to the American Meteor Society.
To get a hint at when to best watch for the Lyrids, you can use this tool, which relies on data from the Global Meteor Network. It shows fireball activity levels in real time.
And while you gaze at the heavens, keep an eye out for other stray meteors streaking across the night sky. Skywatchers are reporting that the amount of fireballs is double what is usually seen by this point in the year.
Where meteor showers come from
There is a chance you might see a meteor on any given night, but you are most likely to catch one during a shower. Meteor showers are caused by Earth passing through the rubble trailing a comet or asteroid as it swings around the sun. This debris, which can be as small as a grain of sand, leaves behind a glowing stream of light as it burns up in Earth’s atmosphere.
Meteor showers occur around the same time every year and can last for days or weeks. But there is only a small window when each shower is at its peak, which happens when Earth reaches the densest part of the cosmic debris. The peak is the best time to look for a shower. From our point of view on Earth, the meteors will appear to come from the same point in the sky.
The Perseid meteor shower, for example, peaks in mid-August from the constellation Perseus. The Geminids, which occur every December, radiate from the constellation Gemini.
How to watch a meteor shower
Michelle Nichols, the director of public observing at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, recommends forgoing the use of telescopes or binoculars while watching a meteor shower.
“You just need your eyes and, ideally, a dark sky,” she said.
That’s because meteors can shoot across large swaths of the sky, so observing equipment can limit your field of view.
Some showers are strong enough to produce up to 100 streaks an hour, according to the American Meteor Society, though you probably won’t see that many.
“Almost everybody is under a light-polluted sky,” Ms. Nichols said. “You may think you’re under a dark sky, but in reality, even in a small town, you can have bright lights nearby.”
Planetariums, local astronomy clubs or even maps like this one can help you figure out where to go to escape excessive light. The best conditions for catching a meteor shower are a clear sky with no moon or cloud cover, sometime between midnight and sunrise. (Moonlight affects visibility in the same way as light pollution, washing out fainter sources of light in the sky.) Make sure to give your eyes at least 30 minutes to adjust to seeing in the dark.
Ms. Nichols also recommends wearing layers, even during the summer. “You’re going to be sitting there for quite a while, watching,” she said. “It’s going to get chilly, even in August.”
Bring a cup of cocoa or tea for even more warmth. Then lie back, scan the sky and enjoy the show.
Where weather is least likely to affect your view
Storm systems sweep across the country in early spring, and some will be obscuring skies tonight. But there will still be plenty of areas with clear skies, particularly in parts of the central United States.
“The best spot is going to be in the Upper Midwest,” said Rich Bann, a meteorologist with the Weather Prediction Center.
Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa will offer especially good sky-viewing weather and a beach on the Great Lakes could be a nice spot to look up at the stars.
But don’t expect to view the show from Chicago, as Illinois could see some thunderstorms. The weather will be better in the Northern and Central Plains, particularly the eastern Dakotas.
High, wispy clouds are expected over the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and into parts of the Mid-Atlantic. But, Mr. Bann said, “you may be able to see some shooting stars through thin clouds.”
Clouds will be draped across much of the Southeast and the Northeast, though there could be some clearing in Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia. Remember, the meteors could be visible all night long. If you look outside and see clouds, try again later.
Catching the spectacle will be challenging across much of the West, particularly from Washington into Northern California, where a storm system is bringing rain and snow. That system will move east overnight.
There are likely to be some pockets of clear skies at times across southern Nevada, northwest Arizona and southwest Utah, Mr. Bann said.
Amy Graff contributed reporting.
WASHINGTON — Amid growing national security concerns, the FBI said Tuesday that it has launched a broad investigation in the deaths or disappearances of at least 10 scientists and staff connected to highly sensitive research, including four from the Los Angeles area.
“The FBI is spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists. We are working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state and state and local law enforcement partners to find answers,” the agency said in a statement.
The FBI’s announcement comes after the House Oversight Committee announced that it would investigate reports of the disappearance and deaths of the scientists, sending letters seeking information from the agencies involved in the federal inquiry as well as NASA, which owns the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, where three of the missing or dead scientists worked.
“If the reports are accurate, these deaths and disappearances may represent a grave threat to U.S. national security and to U.S. personnel with access to scientific secrets,” Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.), chairman of the committee, and Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) wrote in the letters.
President Trump told reporters last week that he had been briefed on the missing and dead scientists, which he described as “pretty serious stuff.” He said at the time that he expected answers on whether the deaths were connected “in the next week and a half.”
Michael David Hicks, who studied comets and asteroids at JPL, was the first of the scientists who disappeared or died. He died on July 30, 2023, at the age of 59. No cause of death was disclosed.
A year later, JPL physicist Frank Maiwald died at 61, with no cause of death disclosed.
Two other Los Angeles scientists are part of the string of deaths and disappearances.
On June 22, 2025, Monica Jacinto Reza, a materials scientist at JPL, disappeared while on a hike near Mt. Waterman in the San Gabriel Mountains.
On Feb. 16, Caltech astrophysicist Carl Grillmair was fatally shot on the porch of his Llano home. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department arrested Freddy Snyder, 29, in connection with the shooting. Snyder had been arrested in December on suspicion of trespassing on Grillmair’s property.
Snyder has been charged with murder.
There is no evidence at this point that the deaths and disappearances, which occurred over a span of four years, are connected.
A spokesperson for NASA, which owns JPL, said in a statement on X that the agency is “coordinating and cooperating with the relevant agencies in relation to the missing scientists.
“At this time, nothing related to NASA indicates a national security threat,” agency spokesperson Bethany Stevens wrote. “The agency is committed to transparency and will provide more information as able.”
Representatives from Caltech, which manages JPL, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The sun had barely risen over the Pacific Ocean when a small motorboat carrying a team of Indigenous artisans and Mexican biologists dropped anchor in a rocky cove near Bahías de Huatulco.
Mauro Habacuc Avendaño Luis, one of the craftsmen, was the first to wade to shore. With an agility belying his age, he struck out over the boulders exposed by low tide. Crouching on a slippery ledge pounded by surf, he reached inside a crevice between two rocks. There, lodged among the urchins, was a snail with a knobby gray shell the size of a walnut. The sight might not dazzle tourists who travel here to see humpback whales, but for Mr. Avendaño, 85, these drab little mollusks represent a way of life.
Marine snails in the genus Plicopurpura are sacred to the Mixtec people of Pinotepa de Don Luis, a small town in southwestern Oaxaca. Men like Mr. Avendaño have been sustainably “milking” them for radiant purple dye for at least 1,500 years. The color suffuses Mixtec textiles and spiritual beliefs. Called tixinda, it symbolizes fertility and death, as well as mythic ties between lunar cycles, women and the sea.
The future of these traditions — and the fate of the snails — are uncertain. The mollusks are subject to intense poaching pressure despite federal protections intended to protect them. Fishermen break them (and the other mollusks they eat) open and sell the meat to local restaurants. Tourists who comb the beaches pluck snails off the rocks and toss them aside.
A severe earthquake in 2020 thrust formerly submerged parts of their habitat above sea level, fatally tossing other mollusks in the snail’s food web to the air, and making once inaccessible places more available to poachers.
Decades ago, dense clusters of snails the size of doorknobs were easy to find, according to Mr. Avendaño. “Full of snails,” he said, sweeping a calloused, violet-stained hand across the coves. Now, most of the snails he finds are small, just over an inch, and yield only a few milliliters of dye.
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