Article: Herbal and Psychedelic News: Week of September 30, 2026

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Herbal and Psychedelic News: Week of September 30, 2026

Four things moved between September 23 and September 30. The DEA opened a 30 day comment window on putting five tryptamines into Schedule I, Oregon scrapped a fee increase that would have doubled costs for its psilocybin licensees, and two student deaths in Mississippi turned into a call for a statewide kratom ban before any toxicology report came back. The 7-OH order everyone has been waiting on since July still has not published.

DEA proposes Schedule I for five tryptamines

On September 23 the DEA published a proposed rule at 91 FR 60338, docket DEA-1715, to place five tryptamine hallucinogens in Schedule I: 4-OH-DiPT, 5-MeO-AMT, 5-MeO-MiPT, 5-MeO-DET and DiPT. Comments are due October 23, 2026, and interested parties can request a hearing by that same date.

Read the stage carefully. This is a proposal, not a rule. None of these five are controlled federally today. If it is finalized, Schedule I registration requirements and criminal penalties attach. This is DEA's second run at these compounds; a 2022 proposal was withdrawn after pushback. All five are synthetic tryptamines, not plant material, so nothing sold as kanna, blue lotus, wild dagga, akuamma or kava is covered by this docket. Marijuana Moment reports that one of the five, 4-OH-DiPT, carries an FDA breakthrough therapy designation held by Reunion Neurosciences for a clinical program in postpartum depression. We have not independently confirmed that designation with FDA.

The 7-OH scheduling order still has not published

DEA filed a notice of intent on July 6, 2026, docket DEA-1570, to temporarily place 7-hydroxymitragynine in Schedule I above a set threshold. The threshold in that notice is botanical material over 0.050 percent 7-OH by dry weight, or synthetic and processed material at or above 0.050 percent by weight or volume, or more than 1.00 milligram. The comment period closed September 10.

We ran a Federal Register query for DEA documents mentioning kratom published since September 1 and got zero results. The only DEA scheduling document published in the past week is the tryptamine proposal above. So as of September 30 the temporary order has not issued and the thresholds are not in force. STAT reported on September 30 that researchers and clinicians broadly agree 7-OH needs regulating and disagree sharply on whether Schedule I is the tool.

Older but still relevant: on August 26 DEA did temporarily schedule three related compounds, mitragynine pseudoindoxyl, MGM-15 and MGM-16, under docket DEA-1644. That order is in effect. State and local law is a separate question and is stricter than federal law in a number of places.

Oregon drops the psilocybin fee increase

The Oregon Health Authority said on September 22 it will not move forward with the current rulemaking on psilocybin program fees, citing feedback from the Oregon Psilocybin Advisory Board, its rules advisory committees and public comment. OHA says a separate rulemaking on unrelated program changes is planned with an intended effective date of January 15, 2027.

The agency statement does not list dollar figures. OPB and KLCC reported on September 23 that the shelved proposal would have moved application fees from $500 to $1,000 and facilitator licenses from $2,000 to $4,000. For anyone watching whether supervised psilocybin programs can hold a working cost structure, this is the regulator deciding the answer was no at those numbers.

Two Ole Miss deaths put Mississippi kratom law back in play

Two University of Mississippi students, Aidan Hamilton and Robert Strang, were found dead in separate locations the week of September 21. Mississippi Today reported on September 24 that kratom packaging was found during both investigations and that Lafayette County Metro Narcotics said it had no confirmed information kratom contributed to either death. Toxicology is not back. Reason reported on September 25 that the county coroner put the wait at up to two weeks, and the Pain News Network pushed back on September 29 against coverage treating the link as settled.

State Rep. Lee Yancey called for a statewide ban, with Schedule II classification as his fallback, per the Magnolia Tribune on September 28. No bill is filed. This is a statement to press, not legislation, and Mississippi's regular session does not convene until January.

What Mississippi law actually says today comes from House Bill 1077, effective July 1, 2025. Sales are limited to 21 and over, product has to sit behind the retail counter, retailers register with the Department of Revenue, and 7-OH is capped at 1 percent of total kratom alkaloids and 0.5 milligrams per container. There is no statewide ban. Cities and counties that passed their own bans keep them, and reporting places Oxford's local ban at 2019, which we did not confirm against the ordinance itself.

What to watch

Two dates. October 23 is the comment deadline on the tryptamine proposal. The 7-OH temporary order can publish any day, and when it does the thresholds in DEA-1570 become the number that matters for anyone holding concentrated product. Healing Herbals sells several of the plants covered here. Everything we sell is for adults 21 and over.

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Written by Herbal Healings