Is Mephedrone (4-MMC) legal in Mexico?

Also known as: meow meow

Legal status

Mephedrone is named in Mexican law as a psychotropic, in the first of the five groups of article 245 of the Ley General de Salud, the group the Act describes as «Las que tienen valor terapéutico escaso o nulo y que, por ser susceptibles de uso indebido o abuso, constituyen un problema especialmente grave para la salud pública». The list there prints «MEFEDRONA 4- METILMETCATITONA 2-methylamino-1ptolylpropan-1-one». The entry is printed with a misspelling of the common name, as metilmetcatitona rather than metilmetcatinona, and the chemical name in the third column is in English rather than Spanish. Article 248 prohibits every act article 247 lists for the substances in that first group, and article 249 leaves only acquisition for authorised scientific research. The text read for this cell was the Ley General de Salud as it stands after the decree published in the Diario Oficial de la Federacion on 15 January 2026, which reforms article 234 whole and article 245 fracciones I segundo parrafo, II and IV, read together with the Orden Juridico Nacional consolidated text to 7 June 2024 for the articles that decree does not touch, read as at 21 September 2026. The live cell reported that article 234 and article 245 returned no entry for this row, and that report is corrected here: the entry above was read in the printed group list.

Consequences if caught

Where this row sits in the two lists is what decides the rest. It is the only substituted cathinone the group names besides cathinone itself, so the presence of this row says nothing about the other cathinones. Article 479 gives this row no line: the table names eight narcotics and this is not one of them. Articles 475, 476, 477 and 478 all run on the narcotics listed in that table, and article 474 puts a narcotic outside it with the federal authorities, «El narcótico no esté contemplado en la tabla». The eight amounts recited below therefore belong to the eight narcotics the table names and not to this row. The two Ley General de Salud penalty articles that follow are printed here because the live cell printed them for every Mexican row. They run on the narcotics the table names, so they do not reach this row, and the federal code articles below are the ones this row's placement engages. Article 477 sets ten months to three years of prison, «Se aplicará pena de diez meses a tres años de prisión y hasta ochenta días multa al que posea alguno de los narcóticos señalados en la tabla». It applies to possession below one thousand times a table amount where the circumstances do not make it possession for supply. Its fine is up to eighty dias multa. Article 475 of the Ley General de Salud sets four to eight years of prison, in the words «Se impondrá prisión de cuatro a ocho años y de doscientos a cuatrocientos días multa». It applies to commerce or supply, even free of charge, below one thousand times a table amount. Its fine is two hundred to four hundred dias multa. Its second paragraph raises the prison term to seven to fifteen years where the person supplied is a minor or cannot resist, «se aplicará una pena de siete a quince años de prisión y de doscientos a cuatrocientos días multa», and the previous version of this cell called eight years the small-scale ceiling, so that figure is carried forward and corrected here rather than dropped. The federal code articles below are the ones this row's placement engages, because article 193 of that code names the second and third groups of article 245 and the first group through article 248. Article 194 of the Codigo Penal Federal sets ten to twenty five years of prison, «Se impondrá prisión de diez a veinticinco años y de cien hasta quinientos días multa». It applies to production, transport, traffic, commerce, supply or prescription of a narcotic without the authorisation the Ley General de Salud requires. Its fine is one hundred to five hundred dias multa. Article 195 sets five to fifteen years of prison. It applies to possession with one of those purposes. Its fine is one hundred to three hundred fifty dias multa. Article 195 bis sets four years to seven years six months of prison. It applies where possession cannot be so considered. Its fine is fifty to one hundred fifty dias multa. Article 196 raises the article 194 penalties by one half in the listed cases. Article 193 of the same code defines narcoticos in its first paragraph as those the Ley General de Salud determines, and in its second names a narrower set, «son punibles las conductas que se relacionan con los estupefacientes, psicotrópicos y demás sustancias previstos en los artículos 237, 245, fracciones I, II, y III y 248 de la Ley General de Salud, que constituyen un problema grave para la salud pública». This row is inside the set that second paragraph names, so the reach of the federal chapter to it is stated by the code itself rather than inferred. Article 479 is not the controlled-substance list and is routinely misreported as one. It is a short table of eight maximum amounts used by articles 477 and 478 for strict, immediate personal consumption: opium two grams, heroin fifty milligrams, cannabis five grams, cocaine five hundred milligrams, LSD fifteen thousandths of a milligram, and MDA, MDMA and methamphetamine at forty milligrams or one tablet or capsule of not more than two hundred milligrams. Mexico has no death penalty for any offence, which article 22 of the Constitucion Politica de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos settles in the words «Quedan prohibidas las penas de muerte». Those figures are set out here because they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.

If prescribed or medical

No medicine containing it exists anywhere, so the research authorisation in article 249 is the only lawful handling the Act describes. There is no ordinary therapeutic supply route for this group. Article 248 prohibits every act article 247 lists in relation to the substances in the first group of article 245, «Queda prohibido todo acto de los mencionados en el artículo 247 de esta Ley, con relación a las substancias incluidas en la fracción I del artículo 245». Article 249 leaves only acquisition for authorised scientific research by institutions with a protocol approved by the Secretaria de Salud, «Solamente para fines de investigación científica, la Secretaría de Salud podrá autorizar la adquisición de las substancias psicotrópicas a que se refiere la fracción I del artículo 245». A foreign prescription evidences therapeutic purpose and does not create an article 479 allowance or override a prohibition. The special duties articles 240 onward impose run to estupefacientes rather than to this group, which has no ordinary supply route to regulate.

Documentation

Carry the medicine in its original labelled packaging with the prescription and a medical letter in Spanish naming the patient, the active ingredient, the dose, the quantity and the treatment period. Those papers evidence therapeutic purpose and nothing more: they do not create an article 479 allowance and they do not override a prohibition. The entry is printed with a misspelling of the common name, as metilmetcatitona rather than metilmetcatinona, and the chemical name in the third column is in English rather than Spanish. The entry relied on for this row was read in the Ley General de Salud as it stands after the decree published in the Diario Oficial de la Federacion on 15 January 2026, which reforms article 234 whole and article 245 fracciones I segundo parrafo, II and IV, read together with the Orden Juridico Nacional consolidated text to 7 June 2024 for the articles that decree does not touch, read as at 21 September 2026.

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