Rolf Potts: What if I get sick traveling overseas?

Though I’ve been giving advice to independent travelers for almost a decade now, I can sometimes forget the most basic fears travelers face when planning a journey to a new land. Last year, while writing a column for Yahoo! News, I received a slew of alarmed emails when I casually mentioned that eating from street-food stalls is a good way to save money on the road.

By Rolf Potts

In many ways these readers were right to be alarmed, since food preparation is not always strictly regulated overseas. So does this mean that you’re bound to get sick if you travel and eat cheaply in exotic lands? Not if you follow these precautions:

1) Maintain good eating habits on the road

When you first start traveling, don’t react to strange foods or unorthodox routines by under-eating. Regardless of your food preferences (such as vegetarianism), make sure you maintain a balanced diet, with lots of fruits, vegetables, grains, and protein. If you aren’t too daring in the culinary department — or if you think you’ll disagree with the food in certain areas — bring along vitamin supplements.

You can easily keep your health up by staying well rested (even if this means traveling at a slower pace than you’d planned), drinking lots of bottled water, and keeping yourself clean (which includes habitually washing your hands before meals). Pre-trip immunizations are vital, of course, but disease prevention should also be a part of your day-to-day habits, especially in regard to how you eat.

Daring yourself to eat exotic foods (from boiled sheep’s eyes, to fried palm-grubs, to haggis) should be a deliberate part of your adventure — but suffering from exotic gastrointestinal sicknesses should not. An old colonial slogan that still makes a useful starting point in dealing with food is, “If you can cook it, boil it, or peel it, you can eat it — otherwise, forget it.” Remember that tap water can be contaminated, so consider using bottled water to wash food or brush your teeth.

2) Be smart when choosing restaurants and food stalls

When eating at restaurants and food stands, look for establishments with lots of customers (always a sure sign of tasty eats) and healthy-looking employees. Make sure that any meat you order is well cooked when you’re in less-developed countries — and be wary of milk (which may not be pasteurized), “beef” (which may not be beef), leafy salads (which likely haven’t been washed with purified water), and shellfish. Non-purified water (ice included) should generally be avoided — and be sure to check your bottled water for a broken seal (which often means that the bottle has been fished out of the trash and refilled with tap water).

3) Remember that familiar food isn’t necessarily healthy food

Indulge yourself in “American” food from time to time — but keep in mind that a restaurant isn’t necessarily healthy (or clean, or tasty) merely because it has an English-language menu and serves up pizza, club sandwiches, or an “American” breakfast. In Pushkar, India, I once ate lunch at a restaurant that “specialized” in Indian, Mexican, Chinese, Italian, Greek, and Israeli food — and I find it no small coincidence that I suffered stomach problems quite soon after.

4) If you get sick, don’t be afraid to visit local doctors

If any kind of sickness persists for more than a few days, it can’t hurt to relate your symptoms to a local doctor or pharmacist. Most will be familiar with local maladies, and happy to set you up with inexpensive prescriptions for whatever ails you. (Of course, a small first-aid kit full of bandages, antiseptic, painkillers, and personal medicines should already be a part of your travel gear.) If your sickness threatens to get serious, make your way to a major city and check into a modern hospital.

5) Utilize travel-health websites and books, including:

US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Official inoculation and health recommendations for international travelers. Online database includes updated international health news and travel health tips for every country in the world. A great starting point for health and vaccination information about your destination.

Travel Health Online
Well-organized and comprehensive health website for travelers. Gives extensive listings on individual countries, including level of medical care, economic/political standing, vaccination issues, and possible health concerns.

The Pocket Doctor: A Passport to Healthy Travel, by Stephen Bezruchka
A small, easy-to-pack guide to identifying and avoiding ailments on the road.

Rough Guide to Travel Health, by Nick Jones, Pema Sanders, Charles Easmon
Includes a section on pre-trip health planning, an encyclopedia of health problems, and an international section dedicated to specific countries’ health risks.

For a further discussion of travel health, check out chapter 7 of my own book, Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel.

- Rolf

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Editor’s note: Have you or a traveling companion ever fallen ill overseas? Was it easier or more difficult than dealing with the U.S. medical system? Weigh in with your comments below.

Follow this link for the introduction to Rolf’s week-long “Conquering your fears and living your travel dreams” series. Tune in tomorrow for “Isn’t traveling the world is expensive?”

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This entry was posted on Sunday, July 8, 2007 at 8:01 am by Andrew and is filed under News, Tips & Advice, Travel Q&A. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.