DXB banned medicines - 4 years jail
Mods - this ruling affects aircrew worldwide who may find themselves in Dubai one day. Either don't take these medicines with you or get the correct prescription.
Unauthorized Medicines - Ministry of Health and Prevention - UAE Just how they would cope with an en-route diversion where large numbers of passengers were not expecting to be quizzed about their tablets is anyones guess. |
This isn’t new news though. It’s been ongoing for as long as I’ve been going there. Although I do believe they have recently changed the way to declare medicine |
Originally Posted by ETOPS
(Post 10300293)
Just how they would cope with an en-route diversion where large numbers of passengers were not expecting to be quizzed about their tablets is anyones guess.
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Yes - a few Tylenol in your flight case and no paperwork? Straight to jail... |
Exedrin and Tylenol banned? Why?
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Originally Posted by ETOPS
(Post 10300302)
Yes - a few Tylenol in your flight case and no paperwork? Straight to jail...
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Originally Posted by DaveReidUK
(Post 10300300)
Are you saying that every arriving or transiting pax at Dubai is interviewed about the medicines they may be carrying? That sounds like a recipe for chaos.
I think you're using the worry beads too much to 'pump up the issue'. |
Originally Posted by Unauthorised medicines
Sodium Chloride 0.45%
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Sounds like the usual ME power trip.
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This has been an issue for decades. The list contains some items that are not authorised for possibly political reasons such as saline from Kuwait. Saline from St Albans is fine.
Other drugs such as the antibiotic augmentin wont get you thrown in jail provided you declare it, have only enough for your personal use and provided you have the prescription and the pharmacy label on the box. However, this rule is fairly standard. It certainly applies in the US and New Zealand :eek: The issue is certain banned substances such as ephedrine found in many cough and cold remedies in europe. This too is banned in Australasia, but they simply take it off you. In the UAE you may be facing a more difficult time especially if you bought it over the counter. Tramadol and codeine are other problems. |
Up to them...
...to set and enforce the rules they want. There's nothing for anyone else can complain about.
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Not an airline professional, just a pax, but I've been traveling the world all my adult life. Earlier this year arriving DXB I had every little thing in my luggage picked through for the better part of an hour, with great attention and suspicion paid to the medical kit I always carry. I travel in remote areas and bring all sorts of emergency meds with me, which did not go over well at all. I had no idea that UAE was so strict about these things, even over the counter stuff. I carry a blood pressure cuff and even that raised a great deal of suspicion, for reasons I can't understand. I was asked whether I smoked and answered no, then they found a cigarette lighter and gave me all sorts of grief over that. My honest explanation that I might use it to light a candle, or a lady's cigarette, was not received well. In the end they let me keep everything, even the prohibited items, but it was a very unpleasant experience that I wouldn't want to repeat. So yeah, watch it with meds or anything even remotely unusual when entering the UAE.
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Many years ago a friend passed through Jeddah Airport customs with a packet of Fuggles from Boots the Chemist ( so they must have been a medical item he told them)
The "Religious" police then tap ones ankles with a cane trying to find miniatures in ones socks. In the same period sugar was not acceptable at Tripoli as they believed it was not for sprinkling on the morning cereals. Best get advice in advance from trusted locals |
The reason is obvious - it is to avoid competition with their local products!
Er, wait a minute, there aren't ANY |
I do believe this thread evolves from a missive from a certain Big Airway to it’s crews. Apparently the rules changed from Oct 16th. See here for the preapproval one needs Issuing permission to import medicines for personal use. - Ministry of Health and Prevention - UAE |
Originally Posted by ETOPS
(Post 10300293)
Mods - this ruling affects aircrew worldwide who may find themselves in Dubai one day. Either don't take these medicines with you or get the correct prescription.
Unauthorized Medicines - Ministry of Health and Prevention - UAE Just how they would cope with an en-route diversion where large numbers of passengers were not expecting to be quizzed about their tablets is anyones guess. |
http://www.mohap.gov.ae/Files/MOH_Se...28-10-2018.pdf
At this link you will find the list of drugs and an explanation of the need for either a suitable prescription or the statement about whether it is permissible at all for each drug in the list. Having read about people being imprisoned in various bits of the ME for something as innocent as a single poppy seed from a bread roll being found in a pocket of a jacket, I know what my own preferences are regarding travel in these countries, namely I don't go there or go via there to anywhere else. |
Originally Posted by ETOPS
(Post 10300293)
Just how they would cope with an en-route diversion where large numbers of passengers were not expecting to be quizzed about their tablets is anyones guess.
How that will be applied to those landing there unexpected due to diversion is... unknown. Relying on common sense and humanity from customs is risky anywhere, but at Dubai? They don't have the best record for conditions in detention, including provision of needed medication, either. As a pax who needs a dozen pills a day to stay alive, if I got diverted to DXB and there was any option to stay on the plane rather than be taken to a hotel, I'd definitely be doing that - just not worth risking their attitude :(. |
Yet another reason to avoid the sandpit!
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Originally Posted by msbbarratt
(Post 10300476)
...to set and enforce the rules they want. There's nothing for anyone else can complain about.
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Originally Posted by Radgirl
(Post 10300457)
This has been an issue for decades. The list contains some items that are not authorised for possibly political reasons such as saline from Kuwait. Saline from St Albans is fine.
Other drugs such as the antibiotic augmentin wont get you thrown in jail provided you declare it, have only enough for your personal use and provided you have the prescription and the pharmacy label on the box. However, this rule is fairly standard. It certainly applies in the US and New Zealand :eek: . |
“Using worry beads “. ..so being banged up for four years isn’t an issue? As for “suspicious quantities”; like a single headache tablet? |
Originally Posted by lapp
(Post 10301441)
Sovereignist stance out of place. It's very right to complain when their "rules" are applied to whom travel through their country - and pays for that. And their "rules", as mentioned in other postings here, are arbitrary, inconsistent with international standards, and not explained to travelers and crew when they book or are assigned to a flight there.
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Originally Posted by msbbarratt
(Post 10301611)
If it were otherwise there'd be only one country in the world.
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they are just giving travelers more reasons to avoid that place....
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“Rule is fairly standard, certainly applies in US and NZ..”. No it’s not: there’s nothing standard about the threat of four years in prison for what in most of the world is a widely-used over the counter medicine. |
Originally Posted by ShotOne
(Post 10302103)
“Rule is fairly standard, certainly applies in US and NZ..”. No it’s not: there’s nothing standard about the threat of four years in prison for what in most of the world is a widely-used over the counter medicine. |
Originally Posted by ETOPS
(Post 10300293)
Mods - this ruling affects aircrew worldwide who may find themselves in Dubai one day. Either don't take these medicines with you or get the correct prescription.
Unauthorized Medicines - Ministry of Health and Prevention - UAE Just how they would cope with an en-route diversion where large numbers of passengers were not expecting to be quizzed about their tablets is anyones guess. Jon |
The OP's initial list of "Unauthorized Medicines" is a list of recalled medicines, many of the recalls going back to 2010 time frame. Feathers MacGraw's post has a link to the substances that are prohibited in the UAE or limited to a one month supply with a prescription.
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Originally Posted by MarkerInbound
(Post 10302837)
The OP's initial list of "Unauthorized Medicines" is a list of recalled medicines, many of the recalls going back to 2010 time frame. Feathers MacGraw's post has a link to the substances that are prohibited in the UAE or limited to a one month supply with a prescription.
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It'll be interesting to see how this works for passengers coming to and from all those countries where the vast majority of meds (including meds that are prescription-only in some 'grown-up' countries) are sourced over the counter, without a prescription. India, for instance, where you can buy every product you can imagine, as a walk-in customer - and which supplies a healthy proportion of Emirates' passenger load.
Especially as those pax are highly likely to find about this new law for the first time when they get pulled over by the cops while in transit through DXB.... |
For those who nitpicked my last post, I did say the RULES were the same in kiwiland and the US, not the punishment. Both New Zealand and the US have confiscated drugs which have been declared because of lack of paperwork. To be fair, you will NOT be thrown in jail at Dubai if you declare these drugs - they will just take them off you, and do so regularly. Jail happens or may happen if you dont declare. Many passengers dont read the rules and think it OK to wander into country B with drugs from country A just because they were prescribed in A. Caveat emptor
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Originally Posted by MarkerInbound
(Post 10302837)
The OP's initial list of "Unauthorized Medicines" is a list of recalled medicines, many of the recalls going back to 2010 time frame. Feathers MacGraw's post has a link to the substances that are prohibited in the UAE or limited to a one month supply with a prescription.
Jon |
The "Attested medical report" requirement for many medicines is the onerous and unusual requirements. "Attested" by whom, too?
Most countries only require a prescription for most medicines - and since typically one exchanges the prescription (being an order to the pharmacist to dispense) for the drug, the packaging showing pharmacy labelling suffices. The UAE has unusual, onerous, and poorly defined requirements for carrying medicines which are arbitrarily enforced. |
And then there's the countries, like mine, where you don't get a prescription at all. It's all done electronically, where your doctor will place the prescription on a server. When you get to the pharmacy, any pharmacy, all you need is your national ID number and they'll pull the information from the server. There's of course a label on the packing, but that's all. And it's in the local lingo, commonly known as a throat disease with odd grammatical rules.
100K+ visitors from this country play tourists in Do-buy very year, and a significantly larger number use DXB as a transit point to somewhere more pleasant. Sooner or later one or more will hit the front pages of the tabloids. |
I am so glad I read this post. i have been planning a trip to Europe from Australia and was going to transit in DXB: I will now be avoiding it like the plague. I don’t carry “hard drugs” but if Panadol / Tylenol in your hand luggage can result in jail even in transit then this place is not for me. |
Originally Posted by SMT Member
(Post 10304765)
Sooner or later one or more will hit the front pages of the tabloids.
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Dubai has been off my list of places to transit or visit for leisure for some time because of this under-documented, over-enforced problem with medicines and illegal drugs. Frankly, they'd probably find nanograms of cannabis on my bags and shoes even though I've never consumed it in my life - simply from walking around the restaurant areas of Amsterdam on regular business visits there. Having to explain the medicines (not even controlled substances) I carry that keep me alive and hoping they don't decide to throw me in jail is not a strategy.
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Just for clarity, most countries require BOTH a prescription and a LABEL on the packet with your name, the name of the drug, and the amount to be taken. If you have an on line prescribing system, it would be prudent to ask for a print out. And declare ALL drugs
The only differences are that some countries have an absolute ban on drugs that can be bought over the counter elsewhere - Beechams Powders are OTC in the UK but illegal in Australia. The US have an absolute ban on diamorphine, which is a controlled rug elsewher The difference in Dubai is that if you dont declare and they find a drug they tend to be a bit more strict. |
Originally Posted by Radgirl
(Post 10305328)
Beechams Powders are OTC in the UK but illegal in Australia.
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