…for yet another ride on what I’ve come to think of as the “kratom merry-go-round.”
I started writing about problems with this drug back in 2016. I was far from the first. Here’s a post from 2023 that introduced today’s topic by name– it’s Feel Free energy tonic. A link, if you’re curious.
Now we have this, courtesy of NBC News:
On TikTok, warnings spread about the herbal tonic ‘Feel Free’
Apparently, a number of people who have tried the drinks–which contain both kratom and kava– say they lost control of their consumption and suffered mightily as a result.
Initial reports of problems with kratom came from the recovery homes that proliferated in Florida a decade or so ago. The popular wisdom at the time was that these drinks, readily available in convenience stores, were a safe alternative to alcohol as well as an energy booster. Instead, many of the former treatment patients quickly developed the same problems with kratom that they had experienced with alcohol or cocaine or heroin— namely, compulsive use, loss of control, and continued use despite adverse consequences.
NBC’s article features an account from a man who claims that in less than a year of using Feel Free, he was drinking a case of the stuff every day.
The makers of Feel Free, Botanic Tonics, claims sales of more than a hundred twenty million servings, while receiving “fewer than 1000 consumer adverse events complaints”. They insist that none of the complaints involved a severe addiction, and blame social media for exaggerating the adverse consequences of using their product.
That sounded more than a little disingenuous, given that we’ve just read a vivid account of one man’s addiction to their product, in the article itself. He doesn’t count?
Maybe the poor guy didn’t understand the complaint procedure.
Curious as to how this disconnect between maker and consumer may have come about, I googled the company and its founder. And stumbled on this interesting piece in a business publication.
The article describes the founder as very much the successful entrepreneur, adept at marketing and finance, but perhaps, I thought, not too familiar with addictions. It occurred to me that he might be like the former VP of a giant health insurance firm, who claimed he never realized how many people were suffering without healthcare until he personally witnessed the long, long lines at a weekend free clinic.
Stories of personal suffering, you see, didn’t show up on his spreadsheets. He took it for granted that there weren’t any.
So why didn’t people register a formal complaint, since it appears there were plenty of potential complainants?
Maybe they assumed it would be waste of time, and probably wouldn’t do any good anyway.
They very well may have been right about that.
