My Trip To Japan: Bringing Medications Into Japan

There is a lot of information about bringing your prescriptions and over the counter medications into Japan. Please look to the Japanese Customs website to get the proper information about importing medication into Japan. I will just relate how my experience was.

First, I looked at the Customs website and saw the list of drugs that could be imported. One of my was on the restricted list. Fortunately, all that I needed was a prescription. If it was a slightly larger size then I would have had to request permission to import the medicine. There are directions online for how to do this.

I imported three medications. Two were from one doctor. I had my doctor write up the prescription and I kept it in a plastic bag with the medications at all times. I had another medication from a different doctor and I did the same for that one. I was there for 17 days and I took a 24 day supply. I was a little worried about earthquakes and I wanted to make sure that I had plenty of medication in case my trip home was delayed.

On the airplane you have to fill out a customs declaration. I misread the form and I checked that I had restricted substances. I remembered that my single medicine did not actually qualify as restricted. I marked out the checked box and checked the other box. To the side of that I wrote medication. I SHOULD have just made out another form. After a long, long flight you don't always make good decisions.

When I passed through customs the customs officer asked me about the marked out box. She also asked me "What is medication?" I explained what it was for and she stamped my form and welcomed me to Japan. It was actually much easier than my two trips into South Korea. There is a lot of information (some true and some untrue) about bringing medication into Japan. It really isn't as complicated as most people make it out to be.

I did hear about one woman who tried to sneak her medication into Japan by putting them into an over the counter bottle. She was arrested and sentenced for the crime. Just be honest and you should have no problem. Millions of people go into Japan every year. They want to control illegal drugs but I feel that they are understanding about most things relating to medication.