Is Morphine legal in Colombia?

Legal status

Controlled. Anexo Técnico 1 of Resolución 116 de 2026, the Ministry of Health resolution of 27 January 2026 that replaced article 4 and the four technical annexes of Resolución 315 de 2020, lists it at entry 326, Morfina, chemical name 7,8-didehidro-4,5-epoxi-17-metilmorfinan-3,6-diol, Lista Amarilla, Lista I. The entry carries the Lista Amarilla, the list of narcotic drugs under international control, and the graduated paragraphs of article 376 price the offence by grams of derivados de la amapola, which is this family. The article's qualifying clause names the schedules of the 1971 Convention rather than those of the 1961 one, so the drafting is not clean on this point. [Likely]

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. Article 11 of the Constitución Política reads, in its own words, that el derecho a la vida es inviolable and that no habrá pena de muerte, so no Colombian drug offence carries a capital penalty. [Certain] The entry read for this row is entry 326, Morfina, chemical name 7,8-didehidro-4,5-epoxi-17-metilmorfinan-3,6-diol, Lista Amarilla, Lista I. Penal Code article 376, as replaced by article 11 of Ley 1453 de 2011, punishes unauthorised import, transit, export, transport, carrying, storage, keeping, manufacture, sale, offer, acquisition, financing or supply of a narcotic, psychotropic or synthetic drug contemplated in schedules one, two, three and four of the 1971 United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances, with 128 to 360 months of imprisonment and a fine of 1,334 to 50,000 monthly legal minimum wages. Its second and third paragraphs graduate that by quantity, to 64 to 108 months up to 20 g of derivados de la amapola and to 96 to 144 months up to 60 g. Article 384 doubles the minimum of those figures in its listed aggravations, among them use of a minor and commission in or near a school. [Certain] Ley 30 de 1986 article 2(j) fixes the dosis para uso personal at not more than 20 g of marihuana, 5 g of marihuana hachís, 1 g of cocaine or any cocaine-based substance and 2 g of metacualona, and adds that it is not a personal dose, whatever the quantity, where the purpose is distribution or sale. Sentencia C-221 de 1994 declared article 2(j) exequible and articles 51 and 87 of Ley 30 inexequibles, resting on article 16 of the Constitution, the right to the free development of personality. The protection is judicial rather than statutory: article 11 of Ley 1453 de 2011 rewrote article 376 without the words salvo lo dispuesto sobre dosis para uso personal that the earlier text carried, and Sentencia C-491 de 2012 then upheld the rewritten article only on the understanding that it does not criminalise carrying or keeping a dose exclusively destined for personal consumption. Decriminalised is not the same as lawful: sale and supply stay criminal at any quantity. No printed figure covers this substance. [Certain] Anchored at the start of the entry name, so it is not entry 343 Nicomorfina, entry 356 Normorfina, entry 184 Dihidromorfina or entry 306 Metildesorfina. Those four are suffix matches, which anchoring excludes on its own. The entry anchoring does NOT exclude, and which an earlier version of this cell did not name, is entry 327, Morfina, Bromometilato de, chemical name y otros derivados de la morfina con nitrógeno pentavalente, especialmente los derivados de la N-oximorfina, Lista Amarilla, Lista I. A sweep of all 469 entry names found exactly two entries whose name begins with another entry's name, this one and entry 301 Metadona, Intermediario de la. This row is entry 326 and not entry 327. Corrected in this pass.

If prescribed or medical

Colombia's traveller rule runs through the medicamentos de control especial regime. This substance is listed at entry 326, Morfina, chemical name 7,8-didehidro-4,5-epoxi-17-metilmorfinan-3,6-diol, Lista Amarilla, Lista I. Anexo Técnico 3 of Resolución 116 de 2026 names Morfina Clorhidrato on its state monopoly medicines list, and article 1 of that resolution extends the control to every medicine with two or more active principles containing it and to every pharmaceutical form, concentration and presentation authorised by INVIMA or by ICA, without the list being updated. Anexo Técnico 2 classes Morfina among the eleven substances that are a monopolio del Estado, so import and sale run exclusively through the Fondo. Ley 30 de 1986 article 3 limits the use and possession of estupefacientes to medical and scientific ends under Ministry of Health regulation, and article 20(a) routes import and sale through the Fondo. Penal Code article 379 punishes a doctor, dentist, nurse or pharmacist who illegally prescribes, supplies or applies a dependence-producing drug with 48 to 144 months and 80 to 180 months of professional disqualification. The specific traveller certificate requirements were not established in this pass, because Resolución 1478 de 2006 could not be retrieved from an official source. [Certain] as to the listing.

Documentation

Carry any controlled medicine in its original labelled packaging with the prescription. Import, export, processing, synthesis, manufacture, distribution, purchase, sale and use of the substances under fiscalización run through the Unidad Administrativa Especial Fondo Nacional de Estupefacientes or the Fondos Rotatorios de Estupefacientes, and article 3 of Resolución 116 de 2026 allows one month for bencilfentanilo and anhídrido propiónico and six months for the other newly incorporated substances and medicines to register. Constitution article 49, as amended by Acto Legislativo 02 de 2009, provides that el porte y el consumo de sustancias estupefacientes o sicotrópicas está prohibido, salvo prescripción médica. Two official portals print different current texts of article 49 and that conflict is recorded here rather than resolved, so no adult-use permission is asserted in this cell. The resolution prints its entry names in capitals and they are given here in title case. This substance is listed at entry 326, Morfina, chemical name 7,8-didehidro-4,5-epoxi-17-metilmorfinan-3,6-diol, Lista Amarilla, Lista I. [Certain] Re-derived in this pass and restored, because it was on the live cell for this row and on none of the replacements I first built: Ley 1787 de 2016 is the medicinal and scientific cannabis statute, and it works on the Penal Code directly. The consolidated text of Código Penal article 375 carries the note Inciso adicionado por el artículo 12 del Ley 1787 de 2016, and article 377 carries Inciso adicionado por el artículo 14 del Ley 1787 de 2016. Those added paragraphs are what take licensed medicinal and scientific handling out of the cultivation and possession-of-plant offences. Recreational sale is untouched by them and remains criminal.

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