Legal status in Panama

Per-substance legal status for Panama, from sourced statutes where available. Legal information, not legal advice; drug laws change, so confirm with the destination’s embassy or drug authority before you travel.

57 confirmed substances31 not individually verifiedLast updated September 21, 2026

Confirmed legal status

2-FDCK

Legal status: Controlled. 2-FDCK is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «2-fluorodeschloroketamine» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The dossier returned this row as unsettled. It has its own numbered treaty entry with a registry number, printed across two lines. Its unfluorinated parent has no entry at all, so this is the unusual case of a derivative being placed while the better known parent is not.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach 2-FDCK at all. It is sold as a substitute for an unplaced dissociative, so a buyer seeking the unplaced substance may hold the placed one. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not on Panama's medical list, so no supply route exists for it. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «2-FDCK, 2-fluorodeschloroketamine, fluorodescloroketamina and the fluorophenyl methylamino cyclohexanone designation». The parent it substitutes for is not placed, so the substitution runs the wrong way for anyone relying on it. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PF 013 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name 2-FDCK · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

2-FDCK in Panama, full detail →

25I-NBOMe

Legal status: Controlled. 25I-NBOMe is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «25I-NBOMe» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. Two sister compounds carrying different halogens sit immediately above it in the same schedule under their own numbers, so each member of the series is scheduled by name and none of them is reached by reading across from another.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach 25I-NBOMe at all. It is active at microgram doses and is usually carried on blotter, so a quantity that looks trivial can be a large number of doses. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The national medical list holds nothing for it, so there is no lawful supply route in Panama. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «25I-NBOMe, 25I and 2-(4-iodo-2,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-N-(2-methoxybenzyl)ethanamine». It has been sold as a different and better known hallucinogen, so what a traveller believes they are carrying may not be what the analysis returns. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PN 008 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name 25I-NBOMe · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

25I-NBOMe in Panama, full detail →

2C-B

Legal status: Controlled. 2C-B is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «2C-B» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «2C-B» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The dossier returned this row as unsettled, which is wrong in both limbs: the substance has its own numbered entry with a registry number in the treaty schedule, and Panama's own medical list names it. A neighbouring Schedule I entry shares most of the chemical designation and is a different substance, so the chemical designation and not the family resemblance is what identifies this one.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach 2C-B at all. It is usually encountered as a pressed tablet or a powder at milligram doses, so possession quantity says little without analysis, and article 320 sends the quantity question to a forensic institute in any event. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama's national list carries it only as a reference standard held for the Ministerio Público. That is a forensic holding for comparison against seized material and it is not a route by which anyone may be supplied. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «2C-B, 4-bromo-2,5-dimethoxyphenethylamine and bromo-dimetoxifenetilamina». A tablet sold under this name may not contain it, and the corpus carries a separate row for the mixture commonly sold under a colour name. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PB 008 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name 2C-B · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

2C-B in Panama, full detail →

3-MMC

Legal status: Controlled. 3-MMC is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «3-MMC» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. It has its own numbered entry distinct from the para-substituted isomer, and a chlorinated relative was added to the same schedule in a recent update, so this part of the list moves and the position of the ring substituent decides which entry applies.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach 3-MMC at all. Its para-substituted isomer is separately placed, so the same trade name across two markets can refer to two differently placed substances. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It has no place on Panama's medical list, so no dispensing route exists. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «3-MMC, 3-methylmethcathinone and 1-(3-methylphenyl)-2-methylaminopropan-1-one». The ring position is what decides which entry applies, and that is not visible without analysis. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 032 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name 3-MMC · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

3-MMC in Panama, full detail →

Adderall

Legal status: Controlled. Adderall is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «AMFETAMINE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention, through its constituents. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Anfetamina y sus derivados» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The brand word is not an entry anywhere and was not treated as one. The formulation is reached through the amphetamine salts it contains, and Panama's list happens to reach those by a single entry that takes the substance together with its derivatives.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Adderall at all. A prescribed quantity carried for personal use is a documentation question, while an unexplained quantity engages article 321's objective test. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Because the national entry covers the substance and its derivatives, the mixed salts in this formulation fall inside a permitted medical category, so the prescription and the authorisation are what matter at the border. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «Adderall as a brand word, amphetamine, dexamfetamine, anfetamina and dextroanfetamina». Carry the original labelled container and the prescription, because a decanted supply is much harder to explain at a border. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PA 003 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Adderall · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Adderall in Panama, full detail →

Alcohol

Legal status: Alcohol is not placed inside Panama's drug chapter. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama regulates this row through a separate ordinary-product regime rather than through the drug chapter, so the drug offences are not the law that governs it. It is not an entry in either treaty list and not on the national controlled list, and Panama regulates it through licensing, excise and public order law rather than through the drug chapter. The only match a search of the psychotropic schedule returns for the word is inside the chemical designation of an unrelated alkaloid, which is a substring and not an entry.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are Panama's published drug penalties and they are set out here for completeness, not because Alcohol sits inside them. The drug chapter is not the law that governs it; licensing, excise and public order rules are. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and this row is placed outside that regime, so they are recorded as Panama's published drug penalties and not as this substance's exposure.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not a prescription medicine and carries no controlled-substance documentation requirement. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «alcohol, etanol, ethanol and ethyl alcohol». Local rules on public consumption and on sale hours apply and are enforced independently of anything in this chapter. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Alcohol was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Alcohol in Panama, full detail →

Amphetamine

Legal status: Controlled. Amphetamine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «AMFETAMINE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Anfetamina y sus derivados» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. Panama's medical list does not stop at the parent name: it takes the substance and its derivatives together in one entry, which is broader than the treaty schedule's practice of entering the racemate and each enantiomer under separate numbers.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Amphetamine at all. Its precursors sit on Panama's own precursor list, so article 316's unauthorised handling of precursors can arise separately from any question about the finished substance. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama under an entry that reaches the substance and its derivatives, so a genuine prescription route exists. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «amphetamine, anfetamina, amfetamine, dexamfetamine and levamfetamine». Carry the prescription, and expect the entry covering the substance and its derivatives to be read as covering the salt actually dispensed. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PA 003 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Amphetamine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Amphetamine in Panama, full detail →

Ayahuasca

Legal status: Controlled. Ayahuasca is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «DMT» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention, through a constituent. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. Neither the brew nor either of the plants it is usually made from is an entry in any list read here. It is reached through one tryptamine constituent, which has its own entry, and the harmala alkaloids that make the brew active by mouth were searched and found in none of the lists.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Ayahuasca at all. Preparing the brew is extraction or transformation within article 314, and that conduct is reached independently of possessing the finished liquid. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. There is no medical or scientific permission in Panama for the brew or for the tryptamine it carries. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «ayahuasca, yagé, Banisteriopsis caapi, harmine, harmina and DMT». Religious or ceremonial use was not found to be carved out anywhere in the chapter read for this cell. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PD 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Ayahuasca · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Ayahuasca in Panama, full detail →

Barbiturates

Legal status: Controlled. Barbiturates is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «PHENOBARBITAL» in Schedules II, III and IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Fenobarbital» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. This row is resolved member by member and the class word is not an entry. The members read are spread across three different schedules, and Panama's national list names only two of them, so within this single row some members have a national permission and others have only a treaty placement.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Barbiturates at all. Conduct decides the article, and a member with no national permission cannot borrow the authorisation of a member that has one. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Two members are permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so a prescription route exists for those two, and a preparation containing a member that is not named on the list does not inherit their permission. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «the class word and the member names amobarbital, barbital, butalbital, butobarbital, allobarbital, cyclobarbital, methylphenobarbital, pentobarbital, phenobarbital, fenobarbital, secobarbital and vinylbital». Carry the prescription naming the specific member, because two members are permitted nationally and the others read here are not. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PP 008 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Barbiturates · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Barbiturates in Panama, full detail →

Benzodiazepines

Legal status: Controlled. Benzodiazepines is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «DIAZEPAM» in Schedules III and IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Diazepam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. This row is resolved member by member and never by the class word, which is not an entry anywhere. Fourteen members of the class were read on Panama's own medical list and each of those has its own treaty entry as well, with one of them sitting a schedule higher than the rest.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Benzodiazepines at all. Conduct rather than class decides the article, and possession of a quantity beyond personal use engages article 321 whatever the member involved. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Fourteen members are permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so an ordinary prescription route exists for those members, and the question at the border is the authorisation rather than the class. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «the class word and the member names alprazolam, bromazepam, clobazam, clonazepam, clotiazepam, diazepam, etizolam, flunitrazepam, loprazolam, lorazepam, midazolam, nimetazepam, oxazepam, temazepam and triazolam». Carry the prescription for the specific member, because the national list names members individually and not the class. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PD 006 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Benzodiazepines · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Benzodiazepines in Panama, full detail →

Buprenorphine

Legal status: Controlled. Buprenorphine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «BUPRENORPHINE» in Schedule III of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Buprenorfina» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. Although it is used as an opioid, it is scheduled under the psychotropic convention rather than the narcotic one, and Panama's list follows that placement by carrying it in the psychotropic section rather than among the narcotics.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Buprenorphine at all. Sublingual films and long-acting injections are both lawful presentations and both are unusual to carry, so the authorisation is what settles the question. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so the substitution and analgesic routes both have a lawful basis. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «buprenorphine, buprenorfina and the cyclopropyl oripavine designation». Carry the prescription and the programme documentation, and expect an injectable presentation to attract more questions. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PB 006 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Buprenorphine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Buprenorphine in Panama, full detail →

Caffeine

Legal status: Caffeine is not placed inside Panama's drug chapter. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama regulates this row through a separate ordinary-product regime rather than through the drug chapter, so the drug offences are not the law that governs it. It appears in neither treaty list and is not on Panama's controlled list. It is a food and beverage ingredient and a component of non-prescription medicines, regulated through food and medicines law rather than the drug chapter.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are Panama's published drug penalties and they are set out here for completeness, not because Caffeine sits inside them. The drug chapter is not the law that governs it; food, beverage and medicines rules are. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and this row is placed outside that regime, so they are recorded as Panama's published drug penalties and not as this substance's exposure.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It carries no controlled-substance documentation requirement in any ordinary form. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «caffeine, cafeína and 1,3,7-trimethylxanthine». No document is needed for it in any ordinary form, including concentrated tablets and powders sold as supplements. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Caffeine was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Caffeine in Panama, full detail →

Cannabis / THC

Legal status: Controlled. Cannabis is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «CANNABIS» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. That entry describes the material itself rather than naming a single molecule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Cannabis» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The schedule describes the material rather than naming a molecule: the flowering or fruiting tops with the resin not extracted, with the separated resin and extracts carried as a second numbered entry. Panama then runs two lawful routes across that placement, one medicinal and one industrial, and each has its own statute.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Cannabis at all. Cultivation is the conduct most likely to arise, and article 314 reaches sowing, cultivating, keeping or guarding seeds or plants, while the medicinal statute does not permit cultivation at home. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Medicinal use runs under Law 242 of 13 October 2021, the first such statute in Central America, administered by the Ministry of Health through licensed pharmacies, limited to oils and extracts rather than smokable flower, with home cultivation not permitted and the first pharmacy open in early January 2026. Its reglamento is Decreto Ejecutivo 6 of 4 April 2025, and the live cell's citation of Decree 25 of 16 January 2024 is carried forward unchanged and was not re-derived for this cell. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021, the first such statute in Central America, regulated by the Ministry of Health through licensed pharmacies, limited to oils and extracts rather than smokable flower, with home cultivation not permitted and the first pharmacy open in early January 2026. Hemp is lawful under Law 464 of 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025, which defines it as «Cáñamo. Planta del género cannabis cuya concentración de THC no sea superior a 1% en peso seco, denominado comúnmente como cannabis industrial.». The live cell's citations of Decree 25 of 16 January 2024 and of Ley 23 of 1986 with Law 13 of 1994 are carried forward unchanged and were not re-derived for this cell. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «cannabis, cáñamo, resina de cannabis and tetrahidrocannabinol». Medicinal authorisation is specific to the product and the pharmacy route, and it is not a general permission to carry plant material. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · Ley 242 of 13 October 2021 on medicinal cannabis and Ley 464 of 2025 on hemp, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025 · organojudicial.gob.pa · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NC 001 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Cannabis · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Cannabis / THC in Panama, full detail →

Cathinone

Legal status: Controlled. Cathinone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «CATHINONE» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. Panama's national list carries a similarly spelled substance that is not this one. That entry is the milder alkaloid of the same leaf, which sits two schedules lower under a different international non-proprietary name, and the dossier treated the national entry as though it were this row. Reading the entry rather than matching the spelling is what separates them.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Cathinone at all. Exposure attaches to the alkaloid actually present, and leaf material degrades so that the same consignment can change between departure and arrival. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. This alkaloid is not on Panama's medical list. The similarly spelled entry that is on the list is a different substance, and it is not a permission for this one. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «cathinone, catinona, catina, cathine, methcathinone and (S)-2-aminopropiophenone». Do not rely on the similarly spelled entry on the national list, which is a different alkaloid in a different schedule. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PC 010 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Cathinone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Cathinone in Panama, full detail →

Clonazepam

Legal status: Controlled. Clonazepam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «CLONAZEPAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Clonazepam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The national list places it among the substances controlled through international bodies rather than under national control, which matters because the two sections of that list are governed by different addition routes.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Clonazepam at all. Long-term anticonvulsant use means travellers often carry substantial quantities lawfully, which is precisely the situation article 321's objective test is meant to distinguish. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so an anticonvulsant prescription for it has a lawful route behind it. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «clonazepam and 5-(o-chlorophenyl)-1,3-dihydro-7-nitro benzodiazepinone». Carry a letter describing the condition as well as the prescription where the quantity is large. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PC 005 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Clonazepam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Clonazepam in Panama, full detail →

Cocaine

Legal status: Controlled. Cocaine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «COCAINE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Cocaína» under the heading «Sustancias Estupefacientes sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The same schedule separately carries the leaf, the parent alkaloid and the ester group, and the preparations schedule sets a low percentage limit below which a preparation is treated differently, so the material and not only the molecule decides which entry applies.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Cocaine at all. Panama sits on a major transit route and article 313 reaches a drug brought into the territory even in transit, so a transfer through the airport is squarely within the article. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The national list carries it only as a reference standard held for the Ministerio Público, alongside two of its metabolites, which is a forensic set and not a dispensing permission. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «cocaine, cocaína, coca leaf, ecgonine and benzoylecgonine». Transit through Panama is not a gap in the chapter; article 313 names transit expressly. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NC 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Cocaine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Cocaine in Panama, full detail →

Codeine

Legal status: Controlled. Codeine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «CODEINE» in Schedule II of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Codeína» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. It sits one schedule below the parent alkaloid, and the preparations schedule treats low-strength compounded preparations of it separately again, so three different positions can apply depending on the product rather than the molecule.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Codeine at all. Low-strength compounded preparations are treated separately by the preparations schedule, so the product and not the molecule decides which position applies. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name. A low-strength compounded preparation may fall under the preparations schedule rather than the substance entry, which is a product question and not a name question. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «codeine, codeína, 3-methylmorphine and the compounded preparation entries». Carry the packaging showing the strength, because the strength is what decides which schedule position a preparation sits in. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NC 005 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Codeine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Codeine in Panama, full detail →

Crack Cocaine

Legal status: Controlled. Crack cocaine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «COCAINE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention, through the alkaloid it contains. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Cocaína» under the heading «Sustancias Estupefacientes sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The form of the material is not itself an entry and no list carries it. It is reached through the alkaloid, and Panama's criminal law makes no distinction between the base and the salt: article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when fixing the sentence within the band, which is where the form of the material actually tells.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Crack cocaine at all. Preparing the base from the salt is transformation within article 314, so the act of making it is reached separately from possessing it. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. There is no medical form of this material and no prescription route, and the alkaloid appears on Panama's list only as a forensic reference standard. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «crack, cocaine base, cocaína and the coca and ecgonine entries». Article 323 lets the form of the material tell at sentencing even though the alkaloid entry does not distinguish base from salt. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NC 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Crack cocaine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Crack Cocaine in Panama, full detail →

Delta-8-THC

Legal status: Controlled. Delta-8-THC is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «delta-8-THC» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Tetrahidrocannabinol» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The schedule does not carry a single entry for the parent: it names the isomers one by one under a shared heading, and this isomer is printed among them by name with its own stereochemical designation. Panama's national list then carries the unqualified parent name, which is broader than any single isomer.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Delta-8-THC at all. Because the national list carries the unqualified parent name, a product described by that name is inside a permitted medical category while the same molecule outside that route is not. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The unqualified parent name is on Panama's medical list as a permitted substance, so a medical route exists for material described by that name. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021, the first such statute in Central America, regulated by the Ministry of Health through licensed pharmacies, limited to oils and extracts rather than smokable flower, with home cultivation not permitted and the first pharmacy open in early January 2026. Hemp is lawful under Law 464 of 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025, which defines it as «Cáñamo. Planta del género cannabis cuya concentración de THC no sea superior a 1% en peso seco, denominado comúnmente como cannabis industrial.». The live cell's citations of Decree 25 of 16 January 2024 and of Ley 23 of 1986 with Law 13 of 1994 are carried forward unchanged and were not re-derived for this cell. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «delta-8-THC, tetrahydrocannabinol, tetrahidrocannabinol and the named isomer list». The route a product came through matters as much as the molecule, since Panama runs a medicinal route and an industrial route across the same plant. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · Ley 242 of 13 October 2021 on medicinal cannabis and Ley 464 of 2025 on hemp, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025 · organojudicial.gob.pa · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PT 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Delta-8-THC · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Delta-8-THC in Panama, full detail →

Diazepam

Legal status: Controlled. Diazepam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «DIAZEPAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Diazepam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. It is the reference member of its class for both limbs, and the national list places it in the psychotropic section subject to international control rather than in the section reserved for substances Panama controls on its own initiative.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Diazepam at all. It is among the most commonly prescribed members of its class, so the practical question is nearly always the authorisation rather than the placement. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama, so the prescription route is ordinary and the practical issue is carrying the dispensing label. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «diazepam and 7-chloro-1,3-dihydro-1-methyl-5-phenyl benzodiazepinone». Carry the prescription and the dispensing label, and keep the tablets in the labelled container. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PD 006 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Diazepam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Diazepam in Panama, full detail →

DMT

Legal status: Controlled. DMT is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «DMT» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The entry sits in the trivial-name column with no international non-proprietary name beside it, so the abbreviation is the schedule's own printed name and not a shorthand a reader has supplied.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach DMT at all. It is usually encountered as an extract or an infusion rather than as an isolated solid, and extraction itself is conduct that article 314 reaches independently of possession. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. There is no Panamanian medical or scientific permission for it, so no prescription route exists to document. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «DMT, dimetiltriptamina and N,N-dimethyltryptamine». The plant a preparation was made from is not itself an entry, so the question is always what the preparation contains. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PD 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name DMT · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

DMT in Panama, full detail →

DOM

Legal status: Controlled. DOM is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «STP, DOM» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The schedule prints two abbreviations for it in the same cell, the older one first, and gives no international non-proprietary name, so both abbreviations are the list's own words for the same numbered entry.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach DOM at all. It is unusually long acting, which matters for risk and says nothing about placement, and it is usually carried on blotter. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It has no place on Panama's medical list, so no supply route exists. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «DOM, STP and 2,5-dimethoxy-alpha,4-dimethylphenethylamine». Material sold as a different lysergamide has been found to contain it, so the name of sale is not evidence. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PS 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name DOM · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

DOM in Panama, full detail →

Ephedrine

Legal status: Controlled. Ephedrine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «Efedrina» in the precursor section of Panama's own controlled list. That section of the national list is the one article 324 reaches through its precursor and essential chemical words. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Efedrina» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. This row is placed as a precursor rather than as a drug of use, and the national list carries it together with its stereoisomer in the same section. Article 324 names precursors and essential chemicals expressly, so the precursor placement is inside the criminal definition and not outside it.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Ephedrine at all. The precursor articles are the ones that bite: article 316 reaches unauthorised handling of precursors and article 315 reaches falsifying documents or relabelling them. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama under the precursor section, so a lawful pharmacy route exists and quantities attract the precursor controls rather than the drug schedules. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «ephedrine, efedrina, pseudoephedrine and pseudoefedrina». Bulk or repeated purchases attract precursor controls, and an ordinary cold remedy is a different question from a bulk consignment. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Ephedrine was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Ephedrine in Panama, full detail →

Etizolam

Legal status: Controlled. Etizolam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «ETIZOLAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Etizolam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The dossier returned this row as unsettled. It is named on Panama's own medical list and it has its own numbered treaty entry with a registry number, so both limbs carry it and the unsettled reading was wrong on both.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Etizolam at all. Because it is sold online in some markets as a research chemical, a traveller may hold it without a prescription, and that is the presentation article 321 tests objectively. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, which is not the position it holds in every country, so the national listing is the fact that decides the prescription question here. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «etizolam and 4-(2-chlorophenyl)-2-ethyl-9-methyl thienotriazolodiazepine». It is a prescription medicine in Panama's own list, so an unprescribed supply is harder to account for here than in markets where it is unscheduled. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PE 009 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Etizolam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Etizolam in Panama, full detail →

Fentanyl

Legal status: Controlled. Fentanyl is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «FENTANYL» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Fentanilo» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The same schedule carries a long run of separately numbered analogues around it, several of them added after the parent, so the family is covered compound by compound rather than by a class description.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Fentanyl at all. It is active at microgram doses, so a quantity that would be trivial for another drug is not trivial here, and article 323 asks the court about dangerousness directly. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is on Panama's medical list as a permitted substance rather than as a forensic standard, so a lawful hospital and prescription route exists and the authorisation is what will be asked for. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «fentanyl, fentanilo and 1-phenethyl-4-N-propionylanilinopiperidine». Carry the prescription and the packaging, because a lawful patch or lozenge and an illicit powder are the same substance in law and different in fact. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NF 001 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Fentanyl · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Fentanyl in Panama, full detail →

GHB

Legal status: Controlled. GHB is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «GHB» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The printed entry spans three lines of the schedule because the acid name is long, and the abbreviation sits in the trivial-name column beside it, so a reader matching only the acid name or only the abbreviation sees half the entry.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach GHB at all. It is a liquid, so it is typically carried by volume rather than by weight, and the chapter provides no volumetric threshold anywhere. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The national medical list holds no entry for it, so the licensed sleep and anaesthesia uses it has elsewhere have no Panamanian permission behind them on the list read here. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «GHB, gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, oxibato and ácido gamma-hidroxibutírico». Its precursor lactone has a separate row in this corpus and a different position, so the two should not be read together. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PG 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name GHB · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

GHB in Panama, full detail →

Heroin

Legal status: Controlled. Heroin is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «HEROIN» in Schedules I and IV of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Heroína» under the heading «Sustancias Estupefacientes sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. It is one of the few substances entered twice in the same convention, once in the general schedule and again in the schedule reserved for drugs whose dangers are not offset by therapeutic advantage, so the second placement is the one that carries the extra weight.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Heroin at all. Its second placement, in the schedule for drugs whose dangers are not offset by therapeutic advantage, is the one that bears on how seriously the conduct articles are applied to it. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama lists it only as a reference standard for the Ministerio Público. Its second treaty placement is the schedule that exists for substances a party may prohibit altogether. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «heroin, heroína, diacetylmorphine and diacetilmorfina». No medical route exists for it in Panama, so there is nothing a document could establish in its favour. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NH 001 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Heroin · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Heroin in Panama, full detail →

HHC

Legal status: Controlled. HHC is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «HEXAHYDROCANNABINOL» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The dossier returned this row as unsettled, and the reason is a timing one worth stating: this substance was added to the schedule in the most recent update of the list, which the dossier's sources predate. It now has its own numbered entry with two registry numbers.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach HHC at all. Its recent addition to the schedule means products lawfully bought before that change may not be lawful to carry now. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not on Panama's medical list, so the recent treaty placement is not matched by any national dispensing permission. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021, the first such statute in Central America, regulated by the Ministry of Health through licensed pharmacies, limited to oils and extracts rather than smokable flower, with home cultivation not permitted and the first pharmacy open in early January 2026. Hemp is lawful under Law 464 of 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025, which defines it as «Cáñamo. Planta del género cannabis cuya concentración de THC no sea superior a 1% en peso seco, denominado comúnmente como cannabis industrial.». The live cell's citations of Decree 25 of 16 January 2024 and of Ley 23 of 1986 with Law 13 of 1994 are carried forward unchanged and were not re-derived for this cell. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «HHC, hexahydrocannabinol and the hexahydrobenzochromenol designation». Check the date of the list a supplier relied on, because this substance moved recently and older guidance will be wrong. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · Ley 242 of 13 October 2021 on medicinal cannabis and Ley 464 of 2025 on hemp, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30242-D of 24 March 2025 · organojudicial.gob.pa · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PH003 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name HHC · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

HHC in Panama, full detail →

Hydrocodone

Legal status: Controlled. Hydrocodone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «HYDROCODONE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Hidrocodona» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. Its chemical designation is also the stem of two other separately numbered entries in the same schedule, one an oxime and one an acetylated enol form, so a chemical-designation search returns three rows and only one of them is this substance.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Hydrocodone at all. It is usually dispensed in a combination product, so the accompanying analgesic is not controlled while this component is. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so a prescription route exists. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «hydrocodone, hidrocodona and dihydrocodeinone». Carry the prescription and the packaging naming both components, since the combination is what a label will show. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NH 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Hydrocodone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Hydrocodone in Panama, full detail →

Khat

Legal status: Controlled. Khat is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «CATHINONE» in Schedules I and III of the 1971 Convention, through its two alkaloids. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Catina» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The leaf itself is not an entry. It is reached through the two alkaloids it carries, which sit in different schedules, and Panama's medical list names the milder of the two. The dossier's row for this plant did not separate the two alkaloids, and they are different substances with different placements.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Khat at all. The leaf loses its more potent alkaloid within days of harvest, so the same material can present differently depending on how long it has travelled. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The milder alkaloid appears on Panama's medical list as a permitted substance, so a preparation containing it can have an authorisation behind it; the leaf itself does not. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «khat, qat, Catha edulis, cathinone, catinona, cathine and catina». Whether a consignment of leaf carries the potent alkaloid at all is an analytical question and not one a name settles. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PC 010 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Khat · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Khat in Panama, full detail →

Lorazepam

Legal status: Controlled. Lorazepam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «LORAZEPAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Lorazepam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. Its treaty entry and its national entry use the same spelling, and the national list also carries the closely named ethyl loflazepate a few lines above, which is a different substance and not an alternative spelling of this one.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Lorazepam at all. Injectable and oral forms raise the same placement question but different practical ones, because an injectable presentation invites more scrutiny. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama, so the prescription route is ordinary. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «lorazepam and 7-chloro-5-(o-chlorophenyl)-1,3-dihydro-3-hydroxy benzodiazepinone». Carry the prescription and, for an injectable form, the clinical reason for carrying it. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PL 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Lorazepam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Lorazepam in Panama, full detail →

LSD

Legal status: Controlled. LSD is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «(+)-LYSERGIDE» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Lisérgida» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The schedule prints the international non-proprietary name and carries the familiar abbreviations beside it in the trivial-name column, so a search of Panamanian text for the three-letter abbreviation alone would miss the entry that does the work.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach LSD at all. Doses are carried on blotter, so the weight of the article is almost never the weight of the drug, and article 323 tells the court to weigh dangerousness and market value rather than mass. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The national medical list carries it, but only as a reference standard held for the Ministerio Público, which is a forensic holding and not a dispensing route. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «LSD, LSD-25, lisergida and lysergide». Expect the blotter and not the active weight to be what is presented at a border. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PL 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name LSD · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

LSD in Panama, full detail →

MDA

Legal status: Controlled. MDA is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «TENAMFETAMINE» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Tenanfetamina» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The international non-proprietary name and the familiar abbreviation are different words for the same substance, and Panama's medical list uses the Spanish form of the non-proprietary name rather than the abbreviation, so a search of the national list for the abbreviation returns nothing while the substance is on it.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach MDA at all. It is commonly sold as, or alongside, a better known relative, so the substance actually present may not be the one intended. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama carries it only as a reference standard held for the Ministerio Público, so the listing evidences forensic comparison material and not supply. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «MDA, tenamfetamine, tenanfetamina and alpha-methyl-3,4-methylenedioxyphenethylamine». Analysis rather than the name of sale is what would decide which row applies to seized material. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 014 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name MDA · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

MDA in Panama, full detail →

MDMA

Legal status: Controlled. MDMA is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «MDMA» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «MDMA» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. A second and different substance appears under a closely similar printed abbreviation in the next schedule down, so the chemical designation is what separates them and an abbreviation match alone would not.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach MDMA at all. It is usually encountered as a pressed tablet whose content varies widely, and article 323 directs the court to the dangerousness and market value of the drug rather than the mass of the tablet. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama's medical list names it only as a reference standard held for the Ministerio Público, so the listing is evidence of forensic holding and not of any permitted therapeutic supply. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «MDMA, éxtasis and N,alpha-dimethyl-3,4-methylenedioxyphenethylamine». Tablets sold under this name frequently contain other scheduled substances, each of which has its own row and its own placement. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 011 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name MDMA · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

MDMA in Panama, full detail →

MDPV

Legal status: Controlled. MDPV is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «MDPV» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «MDPV» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The dossier returned this row as unsettled. Both limbs carry it: it has a numbered treaty entry with a registry number, and Panama's own list names it. The national list also carries two further cathinone-type substances in the same reference-standard group, which is a forensic set assembled for seized material.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach MDPV at all. It is active at low doses and is often mixed into other powders, so the amount present may be a fraction of the material's weight. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama holds it only as a reference standard for the Ministerio Público, so the national listing is not a medical permission. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «MDPV, methylenedioxypyrovalerone and the benzodioxol pyrrolidinyl pentanone designation». Its presence in a mixture is analytical rather than visible, and the mixture's weight is not its weight. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 021 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name MDPV · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

MDPV in Panama, full detail →

Mephedrone (4-MMC)

Legal status: Controlled. Mephedrone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «mephedrone» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The entry prints the trivial name together with the positional chemical name, and a different positional isomer of the same compound has its own separate entry in the same schedule, so the position of the ring substituent is what distinguishes two scheduled substances.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Mephedrone at all. It is sold as a powder at high doses relative to other placed stimulants, so quantities are correspondingly larger for the same number of doses. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Nothing corresponding to it appears on Panama's medical list, so no dispensing route exists. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «mephedrone, mefedrona, 4-MMC and 4-methylmethcathinone». A powder sold under this name may be a positional isomer, and the isomer is separately placed. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 022 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Mephedrone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Mephedrone (4-MMC) in Panama, full detail →

Mescaline

Legal status: Controlled. Mescaline is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «mescaline» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The schedule prints the trivial name in lower case with the chemical designation beside it, and no international non-proprietary name is given, so the chemical designation is the column that settles identity.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Mescaline at all. The alkaloid is most often encountered inside plant material, and preparing that material is conduct article 314 describes as extraction or transformation. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The national medical list holds no entry for it, so Panama offers no dispensing route for it in any strength. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «mescaline, mescalina and 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine». A quantity of cactus is not a quantity of alkaloid, and no published Panamanian table converts between them. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Mescaline · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Mescaline in Panama, full detail →

Methadone

Legal status: Controlled. Methadone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «METHADONE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Metadona» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The schedule carries a separate numbered entry for its synthesis intermediate, so the intermediate is placed in its own right and is not reached by reading the substance entry broadly.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Methadone at all. Take-home doses for a substitution programme are a lawful presentation that looks unusual at a border, and the authorisation is what distinguishes them. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, which is the listing that makes a substitution programme possible at all. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «methadone, metadona and 6-dimethylamino-4,4-diphenyl-3-heptanone». Carry the programme documentation as well as the prescription, since the quantity for a take-home supply can be substantial. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NM 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Methadone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Methadone in Panama, full detail →

Methamphetamine

Legal status: Controlled. Methamphetamine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «METAMFETAMINE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Metanfetamina» under the heading «Sustancias Psicotrópicas sujetas a Control por Organismos Internacionales», qualified «como patrón estándar para Ministerio Público», which is a forensic reference standard held for the prosecution service and not a permission to supply. The schedule carries two separate numbered entries under the same international non-proprietary name, one for the single enantiomer and one for the racemate, so both optical forms are placed and neither depends on the other.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Methamphetamine at all. Manufacture engages article 314 and the precursor articles 315 and 316 at the same time, because the chemicals used are themselves controlled. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama names it on the medical list only as a reference standard for the Ministerio Público, so there is no therapeutic supply route behind that listing. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «methamphetamine, metanfetamina, metamfetamine and N,alpha-dimethylphenethylamine». Its precursors are on Panama's own list, so a precursor question can arise even where the finished substance is not present. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 005 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Methamphetamine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Methamphetamine in Panama, full detail →

Methaqualone (Quaaludes)

Legal status: Controlled. Methaqualone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «METHAQUALONE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. Its chlorinated relative is separately entered in the same schedule under its own international non-proprietary name, so the quinazolinone group is covered compound by compound. Panama's medical list carries neither, which is consistent with the substance having been withdrawn from therapeutic use.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Methaqualone at all. It is no longer manufactured for therapy, so any material encountered is illicit by origin and the authorisation limb offers nothing. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. No medical or scientific permission exists for it in Panama, and none would be expected for a substance withdrawn from therapy. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «methaqualone, metacualona, mecloqualone and 2-methyl-3-o-tolyl quinazolinone». No lawful supply exists anywhere, so there is no prescription or packaging that could account for it. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 006 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Methaqualone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Methaqualone (Quaaludes) in Panama, full detail →

Methylone

Legal status: Controlled. Methylone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «methylone» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The entry pairs the trivial name with a beta-keto description of the better-known compound it resembles, so the schedule identifies it by relation to another scheduled substance while still giving it its own number.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Methylone at all. It is frequently sold in place of a better known relative, so what is present and what was sought can differ. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not on Panama's medical list, so there is no lawful supply route for it. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «methylone, metilona, beta-keto-MDMA and bk-MDMA». The name it is sold under is not evidence of what it is, and the two substances sit in different schedules. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 023 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Methylone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Methylone in Panama, full detail →

Methylphenidate

Legal status: Controlled. Methylphenidate is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «METHYLPHENIDATE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Metilfenidato» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The treaty entry gives an international non-proprietary name with no trivial name beside it, and Panama's medical list uses the Spanish form of that same name, so the two limbs agree on identity without any interpretive step.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Methylphenidate at all. A prescribed course carried in its dispensed packaging is a documentation matter; the objective test in article 321 is what a bulk quantity would meet. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so the ordinary prescription route applies and the paperwork is the practical question. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «methylphenidate, metilfenidato and methyl alpha-phenyl-2-piperidine acetate». Carry the prescription and the dispensing label, and expect a long course to attract more questions than a short one. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 007 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Methylphenidate · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Methylphenidate in Panama, full detail →

Morphine

Legal status: Controlled. Morphine is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «MORPHINE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Morfina» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The schedule describes it as the principal alkaloid of opium and of the opium poppy, and a long run of its derivatives is separately entered, each described as a derivative of it, so the entry sits at the head of a family rather than standing alone.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Morphine at all. Palliative and post-operative use means lawful quantities can be large, and article 316's authorisation limb is what separates that from the offence. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so a hospital and palliative route exists and the prescription and the import permission are what count. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «morphine, morfina and the poppy straw concentrate entries». Carry the prescription and an import permission where the quantity is significant, since opioid quantities attract permission requirements in their own right. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NM 009 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Morphine · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Morphine in Panama, full detail →

MXE

Legal status: Controlled. MXE is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «methoxetamine» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The entry prints the trivial name and the abbreviation across two lines of the same numbered row, so a line-based reading of the schedule can see the abbreviation without the name or the name without the abbreviation.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach MXE at all. It is sold as a powder and was developed as a substitute for a substance that is not itself placed, which is an inversion worth noticing. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It has no entry on Panama's medical list and no dispensing route. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «MXE, methoxetamine, metoxetamina and the methoxyphenyl ethylamino cyclohexanone designation». The dissociative it was designed to substitute for has no entry, while this compound does. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 024 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name MXE · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

MXE in Panama, full detail →

Nicotine

Legal status: Nicotine is not placed inside Panama's drug chapter. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama regulates this row through a separate ordinary-product regime rather than through the drug chapter, so the drug offences are not the law that governs it. The alkaloid is in neither treaty list and not on Panama's controlled list. Panama regulates it through tobacco control and consumer product law, a separate regime with its own restrictions on sale, advertising and use in public places.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are Panama's published drug penalties and they are set out here for completeness, not because Nicotine sits inside them. Tobacco control rules and not the drug chapter are what restrict it, and those rules are enforced in their own right. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and this row is placed outside that regime, so they are recorded as Panama's published drug penalties and not as this substance's exposure.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Replacement therapy products are medicines or consumer products under those regimes rather than controlled substances. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «nicotine, nicotina and Nicotiana». Restrictions on use in enclosed public places apply and are separate from anything in this chapter. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Nicotine was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Nicotine in Panama, full detail →

Nimetazepam

Legal status: Controlled. Nimetazepam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «NIMETAZEPAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. It has its own treaty entry with a registry number, but it is the one member of its class read for this corpus that is absent from Panama's national list while fourteen of its relatives are named there. So within a single class this row has a treaty placement and no national permission.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Nimetazepam at all. Because no national permission exists for it while it exists for fourteen of its relatives, a prescription issued elsewhere has nothing on the national list to match. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama on the list read here, unlike fourteen of its class relatives, so no national dispensing route exists for it. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «nimetazepam and 1,3-dihydro-1-methyl-7-nitro-5-phenyl benzodiazepinone». A prescription from another country will not correspond to any entry on Panama's list for this member. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PN 001 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Nimetazepam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Nimetazepam in Panama, full detail →

Opium

Legal status: Controlled. Opium is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «OPIUM» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. That entry describes the material itself rather than naming a single molecule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The schedule describes it as the coagulated juice of the opium poppy and adds that preparations made directly from it are treated as preparations of it, while a mixture of its alkaloids is treated as the principal alkaloid instead. The poppy straw concentrate entries sit beside it as intermediate raw materials in five separate varieties.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Opium at all. Preparations made directly from the raw material are treated as preparations of it, while a mixture of its alkaloids is treated as the principal alkaloid instead, and that distinction changes which entry applies. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. The raw material is not on Panama's medical list, although several of the alkaloids obtained from it are named there individually, so the permission attaches to the isolated alkaloid and not to the juice. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «opium, opio, adormidera, poppy straw and concentrate of poppy straw». Traditional preparations are reached as preparations of the raw material rather than needing an entry of their own. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NO 001 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Opium · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Opium in Panama, full detail →

Oxycodone

Legal status: Controlled. Oxycodone is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «OXYCODONE» in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Oxicodona» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. The schedule describes it as a derivative of morphine and gives its chemical designation, which is the column that separates it from the closely named relative that follows it in the list.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Oxycodone at all. Modified-release tablets carry large individual doses, so a small number of tablets can be a large quantity of drug. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so the prescription route is ordinary and the dispensing record is the practical question. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «oxycodone, oxicodona and 14-hydroxydihydrocodeinone». Carry the prescription and the original packaging, because the strength printed on the box is what makes a small count explicable. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025, the schedules of the 1961 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code NO 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Oxycodone · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Oxycodone in Panama, full detail →

PCP

Legal status: Controlled. PCP is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «PHENCYCLIDINE» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. Three further cyclohexylamine relatives are separately scheduled one list higher under their own international non-proprietary names, so the group is covered entry by entry and the placement of this one does not rest on any of them.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach PCP at all. It is usually encountered applied to plant material rather than on its own, which makes the material a preparation and raises the same extraction and transformation questions article 314 describes. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. Panama permits no medical or scientific use of it, and the national list carries no entry against which a prescription could be checked. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «PCP, phencyclidine, fenciclidina and 1-(1-phenylcyclohexyl)piperidine». Its withdrawal from human medicine means no prescription route exists to fall back on. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PP 005 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name PCP · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

PCP in Panama, full detail →

Peyote

Legal status: Controlled. Peyote is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «mescaline» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention, through its principal alkaloid. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The cactus itself is not an entry in any schedule read for this cell. It is reached through the alkaloid it contains, which is what the dossier's own row for this plant relied on, and the botanical name it added to that row was not found in any list read here.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Peyote at all. Cultivating the cactus engages article 314's sowing and cultivation limb even though the plant has no entry of its own, because the plant produces a scheduled alkaloid. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. No Panamanian medical or scientific permission covers the plant or the alkaloid, so there is no prescription route. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «peyote, Lophophora williamsii, mescaline and mescalina». Ceremonial or religious use was not found to be carved out anywhere in the chapter read for this cell. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PM 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Peyote · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Peyote in Panama, full detail →

Pink Cocaine / Tusi

Legal status: Pink cocaine is a label rather than a substance, and that is the finding for this row rather than a gap in it. No list can carry a label, so it is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama therefore has no closed criminal schedule of its own. A substance is reached where it produces physical or psychic dependence and where the health legislation and the international conventions in force in Panama place it, so a reader looking for a Panamanian chemical annex to be absent from is looking for a document the criminal law does not use. Exposure follows the proved constituent, and each constituent this corpus carries has its own row and its own placement. The street name does not designate one substance and no list can carry it. Material sold under it has been found to contain a mixture whose components vary between samples, and each proved component has its own row and its own placement in this corpus.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are set out in full because the placement question for Pink cocaine is open, and if it were answered against the traveller these are the provisions that would apply. Exposure follows whichever proved constituent is found, and a single sample can engage several rows of this corpus at once. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and whether the offence reaches this row at all is exactly what was not established.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. There is nothing to prescribe and nothing to check a prescription against, because the label does not name a substance. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «tusi, tucibi, cocaína rosa and pink cocaine as a label». Do not treat the label as telling you what you are carrying, because the components vary between samples. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Pink cocaine was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Pink Cocaine / Tusi in Panama, full detail →

Poppers

Legal status: Poppers is a label rather than a substance, and that is the finding for this row rather than a gap in it. No list can carry a label, so it is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama therefore has no closed criminal schedule of its own. A substance is reached where it produces physical or psychic dependence and where the health legislation and the international conventions in force in Panama place it, so a reader looking for a Panamanian chemical annex to be absent from is looking for a document the criminal law does not use. Exposure follows the proved constituent, and each constituent this corpus carries has its own row and its own placement. This is a product-class label rather than a chemical, and no list carries labels. The alkyl nitrite actually present is what any placement would have to attach to, and one of those nitrites has its own row in this corpus.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are set out in full because the placement question for Poppers is open, and if it were answered against the traveller these are the provisions that would apply. Any exposure attaches to the nitrite actually present rather than to the product, and the product name tells a reader nothing about that. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and whether the offence reaches this row at all is exactly what was not established.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. There is no prescription route for a product class, and the national list carries no nitrite of this kind. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «poppers, nitrito de alquilo, alkyl nitrite and the individual nitrite names». Read the row for the specific nitrite where the bottle names one, because the label is not a legal category. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Poppers was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Poppers in Panama, full detail →

Psilocybin

Legal status: Controlled. Psilocybin is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «PSILOCYBINE» in Schedule I of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The same schedule separately carries the dephosphorylated relative under its trivial names, so mushroom material is reached by two entries rather than one and neither depends on the fungus being named.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Psilocybin at all. The fungus and the isolated alkaloid raise different conduct questions, because cultivating the fungus engages article 314 while carrying dried material engages article 320 or article 321. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. No medical or scientific permission exists for it in Panama: the national list carries no entry for it, so there is no lawful dispensing route to hold a prescription against. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «psilocybin, psilocybine, psilocibina, psilocin and psilotsin». A dried mushroom is reached through its alkaloids and not through any entry naming the fungus, so a search for the mushroom's name proves nothing. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Psilocybin was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Psilocybin in Panama, full detail →

Synthetic Cannabinoids (K2 / Spice)

Legal status: Controlled. Synthetic cannabinoids is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «ADB-BUTINACA» in Schedule II of the 1971 Convention, member by member. The name sits in the other non-proprietary or trivial column of that schedule, with no international non-proprietary name beside it. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025, which is the national list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use. That is an absence from a medical permission list and not an absence from the offence. The class word is not an entry anywhere, and this row is resolved only through named members. Fourteen indazole and indole carboxamide members were read in the schedule under their own code names with registry numbers, and a compound not among them is not placed by belonging to the family.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Synthetic cannabinoids at all. Exposure attaches to the named member actually present, and sprayed plant material weighs far more than the compound it carries. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. None of the named members is on Panama's medical list, so there is no dispensing route for any of them. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «the class word and the member names AM-2201, 5F-APINACA, 5F-AMB, ADB-BUTINACA, AB-CHMINACA, CUMYL-4CN-BINACA, ADB-CHMINACA, ADB-FUBINACA, AB-FUBINACA, JWH-018, MDMB-CHMICA, MDMB-4en-PINACA, AB-PINACA, UR-144 and XLR-11». The weight of sprayed herbal material is not the weight of the compound, and only analysis identifies which member is present. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PA 008 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Synthetic cannabinoids · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Synthetic Cannabinoids (K2 / Spice) in Panama, full detail →

Tobacco

Legal status: Tobacco is not placed inside Panama's drug chapter. It is not named in Resolución 200 of 2025 and no entry for it was read in the schedules of the 1961 or 1971 Conventions. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». Panama regulates this row through a separate ordinary-product regime rather than through the drug chapter, so the drug offences are not the law that governs it. The leaf and its botanical genus appear in neither treaty list and not on Panama's controlled list. Panama has a developed tobacco control regime, including restrictions on smoking in enclosed public places, and that regime and not the drug chapter is where the rules for this row live.
Consequences if caught: The articles below are Panama's published drug penalties and they are set out here for completeness, not because Tobacco sits inside them. Customs allowances and tobacco control rules govern it, and neither is part of the drug chapter. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and this row is placed outside that regime, so they are recorded as Panama's published drug penalties and not as this substance's exposure.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is not a medicine and there is no prescription or controlled-substance documentation for it. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «tobacco, tabaco, Nicotiana tabacum and nicotina». Duty-free allowances and restrictions on smoking in enclosed public places are the rules that actually bear on a traveller here. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · searched in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025 and the INCB Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025 and no entry was returned, which is a finding about those lists and not about the dependence limb of article 324 · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · no identification code is cited for this row because no entry for Tobacco was matched in either convention list, and the national list prints entries without codes · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Tobacco in Panama, full detail →

Xanax (Alprazolam)

Legal status: Controlled. Alprazolam is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «ALPRAZOLAM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Alprazolam» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. It is the first substance printed on Panama's national list, and the same name opens the fourth treaty schedule's triazolo group, so both limbs carry it under the identical spelling with no Spanish variant to reconcile.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Alprazolam at all. A dispensed course is a documentation question; a loose quantity without packaging is what article 321's objective test is written for. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so a prescription route exists and the dispensing record is what will be asked for. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «alprazolam and 8-chloro-1-methyl-6-phenyl-4H-s-triazolo benzodiazepine». Carry the original packaging and the prescription, since loose tablets are the hardest presentation to explain. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PA 004 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Alprazolam · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Xanax (Alprazolam) in Panama, full detail →

Zolpidem

Legal status: Controlled. Zolpidem is reached by the Panamanian criminal definition of a drug, not by a national chemical annex. Article 324 of the Código Penal defines the criminal object for the whole drug chapter, and it does so functionally and by incorporation rather than by a closed national list: «droga es toda sustancia que produzca dependencia física o síquica, como los narcóticos, fármacos, estupefacientes y todos aquellos productos, precursores y sustancias químicas esenciales que sirven para su elaboración, transformación o preparación, de conformidad con las disposiciones legales en materia de salud, convenios y acuerdos internacionales vigentes en la República de Panamá.». The entry read for this row is «ZOLPIDEM» in Schedule IV of the 1971 Convention. The name sits in the international non-proprietary column of that schedule. Panama's own Listado Oficial carries «Zolpidem» as a substance permitted for medical and scientific use. It is the last substance printed in the internationally controlled psychotropic section of Panama's list before the forensic reference standards begin, and the national list separately carries a related non-benzodiazepine hypnotic in its national-control section, which is the section Panama fills on its own initiative.
Consequences if caught: The conduct and not the substance decides which article applies, and the placement established above is what lets these articles reach Zolpidem at all. A dispensed course is a documentation question; an unexplained bulk quantity is what article 321 tests objectively. Article 321 sets 8 to 12 years of prison for unlawful possession in circumstances objectively showing it is not for consumption, and its printed words are «Quien ilícitamente posea drogas, en circunstancias que objetivamente permitan determinar que no es para el consumo, será sancionado con ocho a doce años de prisión.». Article 312 sets the same 8 to 12 years where two or more people agree to commit a drug offence. Article 313 sets 10 to 15 years for bringing a drug into the national territory, even in transit, and raises that by a third to a half where the drug is brought in for local sale or distribution. Article 314 sets 10 to 15 years for sowing, cultivating, extracting, transforming or manufacturing, and article 318 sets 10 to 15 years for buying, selling, storing or exchanging for commercial purposes, doubled in the five aggravated cases it lists. Article 319 sets 8 to 12 years for devoting premises or a vehicle to drug activity, rising to 10 to 15 years for the owner of a commercial place open to the public. Article 322 sets 20 to 25 years where conduct under articles 312, 313 or 321 is carried out by the leaders, directors or organisers of a criminal band, and its words are «la pena será de veinte a veinticinco años de prisión.», so the ceiling this chapter carries is 25 years. The dossier for this country stated that ceiling as 20 years and that is corrected here against the article itself. Article 320 covers buying or possessing for one's own consumption in scarce quantity, and its penalty is a fine of 50 to 250 day units, weekend arrest or community work, in the words «Quien ilícitamente compre o posea drogas para su consumo en escasa cantidad será sancionado con cincuenta a doscientos cincuenta días-multa o arresto de fines de semana o trabajo comunitario.». Where the person is physically or psychically dependent and the quantity is scarce, article 320 imposes a security measure instead. The live cell attributed a band of 2 to 4 years to article 320; that band is in the third paragraph of article 313 and it applies where a drug is brought into the country and the scarce quantity and the other circumstances show unequivocally that it is for personal consumption, in the words «La sanción será de dos a cuatro años de prisión o su equivalente en días-multa o medidas curativas cuando, por su escasa cantidad y demás circunstancias, se determine inequívocamente que la droga es para el consumo personal.». Panama publishes no numerical quantity table for this corpus. Article 320 provides that scarce quantity for personal use is the measure the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses determines in each case according to the person's state of dependence, «Se entenderá por cantidad escasa destinada a su uso personal la medida que determine el Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, en cada caso, según el estado de dependencia de la persona.», so the live cell's gloss of a single dose is corrected here as not what the article says. Article 323 directs the court to weigh the dangerousness of the drug and its market value when placing a sentence inside a band. Panama provides no death penalty for any drug offence. Those figures are carried forward from the live cell and re-derived against the Penal Code itself, and they describe the offences that this row's placement brings into play.
If prescribed / medical: Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025, sets Panama's Listado Oficial under Ley 14 of 19 May 2016 and Decreto Ejecutivo 183 of 8 June 2018. It is a list of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, not a criminal schedule, so absence from it is not lawfulness and presence on it is not a defence. It is permitted for medical and scientific use in Panama by name, so a prescription route exists, and the related hypnotic Panama controls on its own initiative sits in a different section of the same list. Carry any controlled medicine in its original packaging with the prescription and the dispensing label, and confirm requirements with your embassy before travel.
Documentation: Recreational drug use is illegal in Panama and there is no formal decriminalisation threshold, so Panama should not be treated as a decriminalised country. The exact strings searched for this row were «zolpidem and N,N,6-trimethyl-2-p-tolylimidazopyridine acetamide». Carry the prescription and the packaging, and note that a related hypnotic sits in Panama's national-control section rather than the international one. The live cell attributed the offences to Ley 23 of 1986 read with Law 13 of 1994. Those citations are carried forward here, with the correction that the articles the live cell then quotes are Penal Code articles, and the Penal Code adopted by Ley 14 of 2007 repealed the 1982 Code together with the offences defined elsewhere that it covers. The Penal Code was read in the Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 as updated to December 2020 and published by the Órgano Judicial, cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019; the two agree word for word on articles 312 to 324, whose last amendment was Ley 40 of 4 July 2012. Every law amending the Penal Code that the Órgano Judicial lists after that consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324. The substance lists were read in Resolución 200 of 2025 as published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A, in the Green List 36th edition of 2025 and in the Yellow List 64th edition of July 2025. All of it was read as at 21 September 2026. Medicinal cannabis is lawful under Law 242 of 13 October 2021 and hemp under Law 464 of 2025 at a concentration not above 1% by dry weight, and neither route is a general permission for any other substance. Panama has no death penalty for drugs.

Panama, Código Penal, Título IX, Capítulo V, articles 312 to 324, the drug chapter, with article 324 carrying the definition of droga · Texto Único of Ley 14 of 2007 updated to December 2020, published by the Órgano Judicial · organojudicial.gob.pa · cross-read against the Procuraduría General de la Nación Texto Único carrying amendments through Ley 70 of 2019, which agrees word for word on articles 312 to 324 · ministeriopublico.gob.pa · MINSA Resolución 200 of 26 September 2025, the Listado Oficial of substances permitted for medical and scientific use, which repeals Resolutions 410 of 2018, 691 of 2020, 782 of 2020 and 176 of 2021, published in Gaceta Oficial Digital 30388-A of 16 October 2025 · dnfd.minsa.gob.pa · placement read in the INCB Green List 36th edition of 2025, the schedules of the 1971 Convention · incb.org · the penalty figures, the citation of Ley 23 of 1986 with Ley 13 of 1994 and the citation of Decreto 25 of 16 January 2024 are carried forward from the live cell and not re-derived, except where this cell states a correction · every law the Órgano Judicial lists as amending the Penal Code after the December 2020 consolidation was checked and none touches articles 312 to 324 · the entry for this row was read at identification code PZ 002 in that list, and the placement was decided by reading that line and not by a substring match on the name Zolpidem · read as at 21 September 2026 · Updated September 21, 2026

Zolpidem in Panama, full detail →

Not individually verified

31 substances are not individually verified for Panama

For these the governing national drug law is cited, but we have not verified that the substance specifically is scheduled under it. Treat them as unanswered, not as legal. Confirm with Panama’s drug authority or your embassy.

Substance	What we found
1P-LSD	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 1P-LSD was not established by the instruments...
2C-E	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 2C-E was not established by the instruments...
2C-I	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 2C-I was not established by the instruments...
2C-T-7	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 2C-T-7 was not established by the instruments...
4-AcO-DMT	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 4-AcO-DMT was not established by the...
4-HO-MET	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 4-HO-MET was not established by the...
5-MeO-DMT (Bufo / Toad)	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 5-MeO-DMT was not established by the...
6-APB	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 6-APB was not established by the instruments...
7-Hydroxymitragynine (7-OH)	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches 7-hydroxymitragynine was not established by...
Amanita muscaria	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Amanita muscaria was not established by the...
Amyl Nitrite	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Amyl nitrite was not established by the...
Cannabinol	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Cannabinol was not established by the...
CBD	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches CBD was not established by the instruments...
DXM	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches DXM was not established by the instruments...
Gabapentin	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Gabapentin was not established by the...
GBL	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches GBL was not established by the instruments...
Ketamine	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Ketamine was not established by the...
Kratom	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Kratom was not established by the instruments...
LSA (Morning Glory)	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches LSA was not established by the instruments...
Memantine	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Memantine was not established by the...
Mitragynine	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Mitragynine was not established by the...
Modafinil	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Modafinil was not established by the...
Nitrous Oxide	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Nitrous oxide was not established by the...
Phenibut	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Phenibut was not established by the...
Pregabalin	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Pregabalin was not established by the...
Quetiapine	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Quetiapine was not established by the...
Salvia divinorum	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Salvia divinorum was not established by the...
Scopolamine (Devil's Breath)	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Scopolamine was not established by the...
THC-P	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches THC-P was not established by the instruments...
Tramadol	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Tramadol was not established by the...
Xylazine	Not confirmed. Whether Panama's criminal definition of a drug reaches Xylazine was not established by the...

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

Before you travel

Verify current rules with the destination country’s official drug authority and your own country’s embassy before traveling. Find the destination’s U.S. embassy & official country guidance →
Non-U.S. travelers: check your own government’s travel advisory and embassy.

If you’re detained or arrested abroad

Contact your own country’s embassy or consulate in the destination immediately, not the destination’s authorities. U.S. citizens: contact the nearest U.S. embassy/consulate and the U.S. State Department at +1-202-501-4444 (from abroad). If a U.S. citizen is arrested or detained abroad →

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