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Welcome to Mumsnet's holiday forum. Discuss all international travel here, including both shorthaul and longhaul trips. Related topics: UK holidays & day trips, skiing, camping & campervans.
Holidays
Where to find legal medicine information
LittleLostThing · 25/09/2019 14:34
I’m travelling to Costa Rica next month and due to my ill health I have an awful lot of medication that I need to take with me. I have prescriptions for all my medicine but also planning on taking a first aid kit with a few over the counter medications (omeprazol, Nytol and co-codamol).
I’ve found lots of information stating that you need prescriptions for all medications taken into Costa Rica and you can’t take more than you’ll need for your stay. But I can’t find anything about specific medicines.
The Laura Plummer case has made me a lot more aware I need to check this stuff before I go (although I’m not taking 500 tramadol tablets without a prescription obviously!). One of my prescribed medications is diazepam and I just can’t find any information anywhere to say whether this is legal or not. If it’s not then it’s not a huge problem, I can probably get GP to prescribe something else.
Any ideas?
Twila1 · 25/09/2019 18:58
Contact the embassy in London:
www.costaricanembassy.co.uk
www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/costa-rica/health
AuntieMaggie · 25/09/2019 19:10
Personally I wouldn't travel anywhere with codeine based products without a prescription as it's banned in some countries.
LittleLostThing · 25/09/2019 20:27
auntiemaggie that’s what I’m trying to find out. I’ll probably just take bog standard paracetamol rather than the co codamol so that’s not too much of an issue. I’m prescribed a fairly hefty dose of diazepam, I have the prescriptions for it and will only take what I need but I can’t find out if it’s actually legal or not.
I emailed the embassy a couple of weeks ago and they just directed me to the uk travel recommendations for Costa Rica and a link to the Costa Rica health department which is all in Spanish. No information on actual legality of specific medications.
Dh is of the opinion that as it’s a massive tourist destination and diazepam is a fairly standard medication there would be more information if it was actually illegal. I’m just a worrier and don’t want to spend my dream holiday in prison.
AttilaTheMeerkat · 26/09/2019 10:13
This may help:-
www.costarica-embassy.org/index.php?q=node/111
also the ISTM database:-
higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com/ISTM/062acfe6-1d82-461c-8965-9948543fc637/UploadedImages/ISTM%20database%20on%20International%20regulations%20%20explanation.pdf
scroll down to Costa Rica (no specific restrictions listed)
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