State Sen. Maggie Nurrenbern is introduced to the Missouri Senate on the first day of the 2025 legislative session (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).
Missouri senators debated a bill Wednesday that would impose age limits on kratom sales and ban 7-OH products, as lawmakers raised concerns about the drug’s opioid-like effects and growing availability.
The name, 7-OH, is short for 7-hydroxymitragynine, and it’s made by chemically converting and concentrating the main opioid-inducing element in kratom. 7-OH is sold as gummies, candies, imitation ice cream cones, liquid shots, tablets and powders. People can buy it in Missouri smoke shops, gas stations, convenience stores and online shops.
Members of the Senate Judiciary and Civil and Criminal Jurisprudence Committee heard support for a ban from physicians and opioid-addiction specialists who argued 7-OH products can lead to addiction. These drugs should be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and prescribed by a doctor, they said.
Opposition largely came from those suffering from chronic pain who testified the FDA-approved medication that’s available has bad side effects, unlike 7-OH, which they say has improved their lives.
Missouri Democratic Sen. Maggie Nurrenbern of Kansas City said several families submitted statements to the committee regarding how these “highly addictive, unregulated drugs” have impacted their loved ones and children.
“I don’t know if there’s any more pressing issue before us than making sure that kids don’t have access to these drugs,” Nurrenbern told the committee on Wednesday morning, “as well as making sure that we’re not doing further damage to our community right now that’s already grappling with so much in terms of addiction and mental health.”
The bill prohibits the preparation, distribution, advertisement or sale of a kratom product to a person under 21, that mimics candy or is appealing to children. It bans combustible products or vapes and any products that contain more than 2% of 7-OH.
It requires disclaimers on labels and that products be stored behind a counter or where they can’t be accessed by people under 21. A person who violates this provision will be deemed in violation of the state’s Merchandising Practices Act and could face a Class E felony.
A representative from Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway’s office said Wednesday that the bill would strengthen enforcement authority. Last year, Hanaway launched an investigation into 11 makers and sellers of 7-OH products for violating the Merchandising Practices Act.
“We expect to share more in the coming months,” said Dan Engemann, Hanaway’s director of policy and outreach. “We do plan to bring cases, protecting Missourians from MMPA violations relating to this drug.”
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services issued a health advisory last year as well, warning consumers of potential health risks it says are associated with 7-OH.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration sent warning letters in June to six manufacturers of 7-OH, and federal action is still pending. The companies the FDA targeted are different from the ones Hanaway is investigating, except for one.
Kansas-City-based Shaman Botanicals LLC — the leading supplier of 7-OH in Missouri — received letters from both the FDA and Hanaway.
The company’s owner, Vince Sanders, told senators Wednesday that Shaman was the first company to make 7-OH products in 2023. Traditional opioid-related deaths, largely from fentanyl, had been on the rise since 2016, he said, until he began making and selling 7-OH products.
“If you overlay that with the presence of 7-OH on the market, it is a hand and a glove fit, as these products came to market in 2023,” Sanders said. “In ‘24, they dropped dramatically. In ‘25, they dropped dramatically. If my conclusion is correct – and I honestly stake my life on that it is – there’s 70,000-plus people walking the earth right now that wouldn’t be.”
He argued studies he funded using beagles and rodents show the products are safe. The studies, he previously told The Independent, were completed as an attempt to earn FDA approval.
Jeff Smith, a lobbyist for the nonprofit research group Holistic Alternative Recovery Trust, said the group agrees with most regulations in the bill but opposes the 2% limit on 7-OH, arguing it would only encourage dangerous workarounds. Scientists use the potency of a substance based on its milligrams, he said, not percentage.
“So if you wanted to game this system, under the current proposal, you could put together a capsule that’s got 20 milligrams of 7-OH and 981 milligrams of mitragynine,” Smith said. “And I would not advise anyone to take a pill with that, but it would be legal under this proposal.”
Smith added that the group, which is funded by Sanders, fears the bill could legalize a myriad of potential dangerous products.
The bill received support from kratom advocacy groups, including Global Kratom Coalition and the American Kratom Association, who have pushed for removing 7-OH from the marketplace.
Natural kratom products and 7-OH are different because of the concentration of 7-OH, said Tom Dempsey, lobbyist for the association. He compared it to extracting caffeine out of the coffee bean, concentrating it, and then putting it in a product and marketing it as coffee.
“That’s in effect what is happening today,” Dempsey said.
Smith compared the difference to eating 40 oranges or three gallons of orange juice to get the benefits of vitamin C, instead of taking a vitamin C pill.
“A businessman in Kansas City kind of figured out a way to pull the most effective part of the plant out and put that into a capsule,” Smith said, adding that he takes them for his own back pain.
Jennifer Rhoad, director of the youth drug prevention coalition Smithville Community in Action, said the FDA “pulls no punches” when it says 7-OH products could lead to another opioid crisis. And in a town of 11,000 people in Smithville, three stores sell kratom and two stores sell 7-OH products.
“As somebody who is trying to allocate funds for the after effects of the current opioid crisis, I dramatically want to prevent that from happening,” Rhoad said. “Senate Bill 927…does not ban kratom, but rather regulates it responsibly, protecting vulnerable populations and ensuring product integrity for adult consumers.”