Is Heroin legal in South Africa?

Also known as: diacetylmorphine, smack

Legal status

Controlled as an undesirable dependence-producing substance under Schedule 2 Part III of the Drugs and Drug Trafficking Act 140 of 1992.

Consequences if caught

The entry is printed with its chemical name: "Heroin (diacetylmorphine)." The placement is the surprise in this schedule and it is worth stating: heroin is in the undesirable Part with the hallucinogens, not in the dangerous Part with morphine, codeine and the rest of the opioids. Both Parts carry the same sentences, so nothing turns on it for a reader, but a cell that put this entry in Part II would be wrong about the text. Section 4 (b) forbids the use or possession of any dangerous dependence-producing substance or undesirable dependence-producing substance. Section 13 (d) makes that an offence and section 17 (d) fixes the penalty at such fine as the court may deem fit to impose, or imprisonment for a period not exceeding 15 years, or both. Dealing is section 5 (b), made an offence by section 13 (f) and punished under section 17 (e) by imprisonment for a period not exceeding 25 years, or by both that imprisonment and such fine as the court may deem fit to impose. The reader should note how wide dealing is: section 1 defines deal in to include transhipment, importation, cultivation, collection, manufacture, supply, prescription, administration, sale, transmission and exportation. Capital exposure: none, and life exposure: none. Section 17 sets out the whole penalty scale of this Act and its highest figure is 25 years for dealing; no provision of the Act carries a death sentence or a sentence of life imprisonment. Section 19 (2) is the provision a traveller carrying medication should know about. If the quantity found exceeds what the accused could have bought for medicinal purposes on the prescription relied on, it is presumed until the contrary is proved that the accused dealt in the drug, which moves the case from the possession scale to the dealing scale. Section 20, which presumed possession from mere proximity, was declared inconsistent with the interim Constitution in S v Mello 1998 (3) SA 712 (CC), and the Act's own footnote records that.

If prescribed or medical

The Act's own lawful route is the set of exceptions in section 4, paragraphs (i) to (vi). A patient falls outside section 4 only where the substance was acquired from a medical practitioner, dentist or practitioner acting in a professional capacity and in accordance with the Medicines and Related Substances Control Act 101 of 1965, or from a pharmacist on that person's oral instruction or written prescription, and is used for medicinal purposes under that person's care or treatment. Section 2 states that this Act applies in addition to, and not in substitution for, the Medicines Act. The Medicines Act schedules themselves are not held in this repository and were not read for this cell, so no medicine schedule number is stated here. This substance has no prescription route in South Africa on anything read for this cell. Its parent substance is in Part II under its own name with a 0,2 per cent preparation exception, and that exception does not travel to the diacetyl compound.

Documentation

Search record. The terms searched were heroin, diacetylmorphine, diamorphine and morphine. One printed entry, in Part III. Part II separately prints "Morphine, except preparations and mixtures of morphine containing not more than 0,2 per cent of morphine, calculated as anhydrous morphine." so the two sit in different Parts of the same schedule. The text read for this cell is the Juta consolidation of the Act downloaded on 29 May 2025, taken from the Department of Justice copy at justice.gov.za whose sha256 begins bc1216a3. It carries the substitution of Schedules 1 and 2 by section 2 of Act 14 of 2022 with effect from 14 December 2022, and it marks section 7 of the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act 7 of 2024, the provision that would amend Schedule 2 again, as not yet put into operation by proclamation. The schedules are stated as at that consolidation and this does not rule out a later amendment made or commenced since. The Schedule and the Part named in this cell are read from the Act itself at the lines quoted; they are nowhere printed in the verbatim quotation supplied for this row.

Drug laws and enforcement change and vary within a country. This is not legal advice. Always confirm with South Africa’s embassy or official drug authority before traveling; penalties can be severe, including imprisonment.