WHY SUPER SPECIOSA DOES NOT SELL 7-OH PRODUCTS

Kratom producers have long fought battles in city council chambers, state houses and even with the federal government over the existence of “responsible manufacturing” of a supplement that has been maligned with misinformation, ignorance and opposition from some in the medical community. 

As more has come to light about products that artificially elevate the levels of 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH) the lines have been drawn for many in the industry between selling a natural supplement and products that pose a risk. 

That is why Super Speciosa HAS NOT, and WILL NOT, sell 7-OH products mislabeled as kratom.

“We don’t sell 7-OH because we don’t think there's enough safety data to support it. The science I have seen is concerning,” said Super Speciosa co-founder Ken Loricchio. “Luckily, we were never under a lot of pressure from our customer base to sell synthetic 7-OH products. I think our customers tend to be well educated about kratom and more concerned with safety and quality.” 

Super Speciosa’s products speak for themselves. 

Numbers Don’t Lie

Using third-party lab test results, consumers can get a clear picture of what they are ingesting with every product sold by Super Speciosa. Starting with the powdered kratom, one serving contains roughly 35mg of mitragynine. In contrast, the amount of 7-OH in each serving falls below the limit of quantification, which means that the trace amount of 7-OH in each product passes even the most stringent restrictions for the amount of 7-OH in a product that is legally considered kratom.

In the extracts sold by Super Speciosa, the amount of 7-OH is unquantifiable in the lab testing, while the amount of mitragynine per serving ranges from 30mg to 60mg. This fits the profile of natural kratom products that feature only trace amounts of 7-OH. 

Although the findings have yet to be officially presented by the FDA, and the study has not been peer reviewed, Supply Side Journal published a report on a dosage study conducted into kratom and spoke with researcher Dr. Christopher McCurdy. 

The findings showed that there were no serious adverse events after participants took up to 12 grams (which is the equivalent of five servings of kratom powder) in 5 minutes. In terms of mitragynine content, that means that dosages that exceeded 150 mg of mitragynine were deemed “well tolerated” by the study. 

This groundbreaking study used Super Speciosa’s kratom, Signature Reserve kratom capsules, to be exact. 

McCurdy said at the time that it is “unclear how the single-sourced, botanical kratom used in our study compares to the wide array of kratom-related products available in the marketplace.” 

The good news for customers looking for ethically sourced kratom products is that Super Speciosa supplied the kratom for McCurdy’s team, which McCurdy said is “consistent” with the natural profile of kratom products. 

At the time of the study, Loricchio made his intentions clear in comments that accompanied that report:. “The industry is under a microscope, and we really want to go above and beyond and show people that we’re doing things the right way. We want to be regulated,” Loricchio said. “We want to be treated like we are a legitimate industry. We know that the industry has real problems — there’s no shying away from that — but these are fixable problems.”

The results of the study show that Super Speciosa has backed those words with action: All products produced by the brand contain explicit instructions and an amount of active alkaloids that have been tested in a human dosage study to establish a safety profile customers can trust. 

The same cannot be said about 7-OH products. 

“I think what’s unfortunate about 7-OH is that it may leave a lasting impression on regulators. I feel like we made major progress over the last few years in cleaning up the stigma around Kratom products,” Loricchio said. “I’m hopeful that we can continue that trend, and 7-OH doesn’t set us back. It’s critical that the world understands kratom and 7-OH are two very different things.”

The Risks of Selling 7-OH

For starters, there are a surprising number of products that feature 7-OH that use names and claims that you will not find among responsible kratom producers. Some offer physical and mental health supports that are not proven by science and are illegal per the guidance of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Others are named after street products, such as ‘Lean’ (a mixture of codeine and soda/candy), and offer highly concentrated products that have the potential to induce serious health events among the young people who are the targets of aggressive advertising on social media. 

At the same time, these same producers tout their products as “natural” and use the same claims of traditional use as kratom leaf products, despite the highly processed nature of their products and the warnings of medical professionals. Scientists have sounded the alarm for years: 7-OH products are a unique formulation of chemists in the Western world. 

That hasn’t stopped bad actors from claiming their products are ‘better’ kratom, when in reality the products being sold are functionally operating as unregulated opioids with a distinctly different chemical profile from natural leaf kratom. 

Instead of a maximum of 120mg of mitragynine and trace amounts of 7-OH in a single bottle of natural leaf extracts, these producers offer a 3.5-ounce bottle that contains up to 120mg of 7-OH alongside other elements such as caffeine and melatonin. Those products contain 20 servings per bottle, giving customers easy access to far exceed serving sizes in pursuit of stronger effects. 

Producers of 7-OH shots and extracts are focused on making mixtures that yield ‘euphoric’ or ‘relaxation’ at the expense of prevailing scientific data. And it’s putting customers at risk. 

As part of a presentation on 7-OH hosted by the American Kratom Association, McCurdy was asked about his professional opinion on the maximum dose of 7-OH. His reply? 

“Zero.” 

McCurdy compared 7-OH products to “putting morphine on the market, over the counter,” and said that purified 7-OH represented a serious risk based on the animal studies he has done on the chemical profile of those products. Results of one of those studies were published earlier this year and showed that 7-OH products mimicked the same properties of classical opioids. 

While the kratom industry has worked together with federal regulators to help study the effects of natural leaf kratom, McCurdy said 7-OH producers have not approached him to study the effects of their products. Instead, that puts the burden on responsible kratom producers to explain the difference between products derived from natural leaf and those that contain artificial enhancements. 

Super Speciosa’s refusal to sell 7-OH products underscores the divide between responsible producers committed to natural kratom and those pursuing chemically altered alternatives. With growing scientific data supporting the safety profile of natural leaf kratom and warnings from researchers about the dangers of 7-OH, the path forward for the industry is clear. Responsible manufacturing and transparency are essential to building trust with consumers and regulators, and that means not carrying 7-OH products.