Far-Off Adventures – Vaccination and Foreign Travel
The time has finally arrived for the highly anticipated trip out of the country. The plans began long ago: airplane tickets, hotel reservations, rental car, sightseeing plans. The bags are being pulled from the attic to be packed, and the excitement mounts with each passing day. Everything is a go.
But wait–what about vaccines?
Is this one more preparation that needs to be added to the “To Do” list? Traveling out of the country can feel like a venture to another planet. Pictures of exotic destinations coupled with new, curious foods dance off the pages of the travel brochures. Anticipating the unexpected can be a challenge for even the most seasoned traveler. However, traveling with children adds an extra dimension to the anxiety-the thought of your child becoming ill in a foreign country is extremely frightening. Your doctor is recommending a variety of vaccines. Are they necessary? How do you evaluate the risks?
Hepatitis B is a viral infection that is spread through contact with blood. In the US, Hepatitis B is primarily found in adults, and is spread through intimate contact or through sharing needles used with illicit drugs. Hepatitis B is more common in the general population in East and Southeast Asia and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Still, the risk of long-term complications is much less than we are generally led to believe. More than 95 percent of those who contract Hepatitis B fully recover, and an infection will result in lifetime immunity for that person. Unless you plan to spend extended periods in close contact with infected persons, the risks of contracting Hepatitis B while traveling is extremely small.
Polio is an infectious disease caused by a virus that attacks the nervous system. The disease is seen primarily in children under five years of age; the initial symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache, vomiting, stiffness in the neck, and pain in the limbs. Paralysis results in approximately 1 to 2 percent of children who contract the viral infection, though the vast majority recovers completely from this paralysis. A few, however, go on to have permanent, lifetime disability.
Polio is nearly eradicated. Once common throughout the undeveloped world, as of February, 2006, only four countries still report isolated outbreaks: Nigeria, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In addition, there have been no cases of wild polio in the Western Hemisphere since 1991.
Polio vaccination of children continues in the US, with 5 doses given prior to entering school, (1) reasoning that until polio is completely eradicated entirely, the risk of reintroducing polio into this country is “only a plane ride away.” However, an examination of the data reveals only six cases of imported polio documented between 1980 and 1998, the last in New York City in 1993. (2) The risk for contracting polio at home is negligible; the risks overseas are nearly the same.
Tetanus is an acute, spastic paralytic illness caused by a toxin released from the bacterium Clostridium tetani. The bacterium is found in soils and animal feces throughout the world. Neonatal tetanus is the most deadly and the type most often pictured in textbook cases of tetanus. However, the vast majority of these cases occur following childbirth and the use of unsterile equipment to cut the umbilical cord. While other forms of tetanus are a serious disease, recovery is the norm. In other words, tetanus is not a uniformly fatal disease. If you are traveling to remote areas, such as the backpacking in areas without medical care and without clean water, you may want to give careful consideration to your tetanus status.
However a word of caution: A tetanus shot does not guarantee protection. In a study published by the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) in 1997, 13% of people who contracted tetanus had four or more tetanus shots.(3) Your best protection against tetanus is to thoroughly clean the wound with copious amounts of warm, soapy water, and to encourage the injury to bleed profusely for a few minutes. Apply hydrogen peroxide to clean your wound, followed by a topical antibiotic ointment such as Neosporin.
WHAT ABOUT EXOTIC DISEASES?
When traveling overseas, it is possible to encounter some illnesses not generally seen in the US. The Centers for Disease Control lists the following infections as possible concerns for anyone traveling to any destination around the globe:
Typhoid Fever, an acute, febrile illness caused by the bacterium Salmonella typhi, is characterized by fever, headache, and enlargement of the spleen. The greatest risk is for travelers to the Indian subcontinent and to developing countries in Asia, Africa, and Central and South America who will have prolonged exposure to potentially unrefrigerated foods.
Yellow Fever is a mosquito-borne viral illness that can vary in severity from a flu-like syndrome to severe hepatitis and hemorrhagic fever. The disease occurs only in sub-Saharan Africa and rural, tropical South America.
Japanese Encephalitis, another mosquito-borne viral infection, is found throughout Asia, particularly in rural or agricultural areas of the temperate regions of China, Japan, Korea, and eastern Russia. The risk to short-term travelers to cities is very low.
For all of these potential infections, it is important to obtain a natural mosquito repellant, one that is free of DEET, the toxic additive found in most insect repellants. , made by Royal Neem. It is free of chemicals and contains many natural ingredients.
Hepatitis A is a viral disease that has an onset of fever and diarrhea, followed within a few days by jaundice (turning yellow). The disease ranges in clinical severity from no symptoms to a mild illness lasting one to two weeks. Although endemic throughout the world, Hepatitis A can be prevented by carefully following the hygiene and following a few food recommendations :
1. Eat only cooked foods hot to the touch. Avoid eating food from street vendors.
2. Avoid eating raw fruits and vegetables unless you peel them yourself.
3. Drink only “safe” beverages: sealed bottled water, hot tea, coffee, beer, wine, and boiled water; avoid drinking beverages with ice.
5. Avoid eating raw or undercooked meat and seafood (hepatitis risk).
6. Avoid all tap water, and be careful of getting shower water in your mouth. When dining in restaurants, ask whether the salad greens have been washed in boiled, distilled or bottled water.
7. Avoid milk and dairy products of unknown refrigeration standards.
WHAT’S RECOMMENDED? WHAT’S REQUIRED?
Although the CDC recommends that all travelers obtain vaccines when traveling abroad, it is important to realize that, with one exception, no vaccine is required before you travel anywhere in the world: they are only “recommended.” You will not be required to have a vaccination record to enter a country, nor will you be required to obtain vaccines to return home. The sole exception is the Yellow Fever vaccine, which may be required if you travel to or from a South American or African country infected with Yellow Fever. The recommendations can vary from country to country; if such a destination is part of your travel plans, you should look up the Yellow Fever requirements for that specific country. (4)
I have been a globe-trotter for most of my adult life. In the past 25 years, I have had the good fortune to have traveled to more than 40 countries. I have never been asked for a vaccine
The Black Death Really Is Bubonic Plague
After extracting DNA from 75 skeletons in mass graves or plague pits, scientists have recently confirmed definitively that the Black Death that consumed more than 1/3 the population of Europe from 1347 to 1353 was caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterium that carries bubonic plague. Other possible causative agents were suspected, like viral hemorrhagic fever, but this recently uncovered evidence seals the debate.
The plague had its origins in the 1330′s in China, which was the epicenter of world trade at that time, and which also is estimated to have lost about a third of its population at the time due to the plague and an associated famine (as many as 60,000,000 people). Several Italian ships had docked in Sicily after stopping in the Black Sea, one of the key way stations in the China trade. Many of the sailors on board were already dying of the plague, and its frightening spread on the ground led one eyewitness to describe the scene as follows:
“Realizing what a deadly disaster had come to them, the people quickly drove the Italians from their city. But the disease remained, and soon death was everywhere. Fathers abandoned their sick sons. Lawyers refused to come and make out wills for the dying. Friars and nuns were left to care for the sick, and monasteries and convents were soon deserted, as they were stricken, too. Bodies were left in empty houses, and there was no one to give them a Christian burial.”
The disease was horrifying not only because of the painful and disfiguring swelling of the lymph glands (the buboes from which bubonic disease got its name) and the red spots that quickly turned black on the skin (the reason the disease was called the Black Death), but the utter rapidity with which it grabbed its victims and turned healthy individuals into pustulating corpses in a matter of days: victims “ate lunch with their friends and dinner with their ancestors in paradise.” Europe had a population of about 75 million at this time, and in 5 years, 25 million had perished.
The pneumonic version of the plague was the deadliest form that it took. Anyone could catch it simply by breathing the exhaled air of a victim. The horrible consequences were described in sordid detail by Giovanni Boccaccio in “The Decameron”:
“The violence of this disease was such that the sick communicated it to the healthy who came near them, just as a fire catches anything dry or oily near it. And it even went further. To speak to or go near the sick brought infection and a common death to the living; and moreover, to touch the clothes or anything else the sick had touched or worn gave the disease to the person touching.”
“One citizen avoided another, hardly any neighbour troubled about others, relatives never or hardly ever visited each other. Moreover, such terror was struck into the hearts of men and women by this calamity, that brother abandoned brother, and the uncle his nephew, and the sister her brother, and very often the wife her husband. What is even worse and nearly incredible is that fathers and mothers refused to see and tend their children, as if they had not been theirs.”
The disease was spread by infected fleas hitchhiking on rats, but the primitive state of medieval medicine, poor hygiene, religious hysteria and gross superstition led to the search for scapegoats. Jewish communities throughout Europe were decimated as Jews were blamed for poisoning the wells or otherwise conspiring to destroy their Christian neighbors. 60 major and 150 minor Jewish communities in Mainz, Cologne and elsewhere, many hundreds of years old, were utterly destroyed and their inhabitants massacred.
It took Europe 150 years to make up for the losses incurred in a few brief years. Recurrent, but less severe outbreaks continued for several hundred more years, and kept the fear of this dread disease in the consciousness of all sentient folk. A healthier and cleaner environment and modern medical science has wrought many miracles, but it hasn’t eliminated the possibility nor the fear of another terrible pandemic breaking out in our own day and age, with all its attendant horrors and consequences.
Basic Facts About Malaria – Malaria Treatment and the Drugs Used to Treat It
Malaria is a mosquito-borne disease caused by a parasite.
Malaria symptoms include fever and flu-like illness, including shaking chills, headache, muscle aches, and tiredness. Nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea may also occur. Malaria may cause anemia and jaundice (yellow coloring of the skin and eyes) because of the loss of red blood cells. Infection with one type of malaria, Plasmodium falciparum, if not promptly treated, may cause kidney failure, seizures, mental confusion, coma, and death.
Each year 350 to 500 million cases of malaria occur world-wide, and over one million people die, most of them young children.
The Anopheles Malaria Mosquito.
Where malaria disease is found depends mainly on climatic factors such as temperature, humidity, and rainfall. The main areas where malaria disease is found are; Africa, Madagascar, India and South America. Malaria is transmitted in tropical and subtropical areas, where the host mosquito, of the genus Anopheles, is able to survive and multiply. There are approximately 430 Anopheles mosquito species, only 30 to 40 of which transmit the malaria parasite.
Only in areas where the malaria parasites can complete its growth cycle in the mosquitoes can humans be infected. There are four species of malaria parasite that can infect humans they are; Plasmodium falciparum, P. vivax, P. ovale, and P. malariae. The time required for development of the parasite in the mosquito (the extrinsic incubation period) ranges from 10 to 21 days, depending on the parasite species and the temperature.
Malaria Control In the United States.
In the United States during the 19th century, and early 20th century, malaria was wide spread in the Southeastern Sates. In 1947 a National Malaria Eradication Program was undertaken by 13 States. The program consisted primarily of DDT application to the interior surfaces of rural homes or entire premises. By the end of 1949 over 4,650,000 houses had been sprayed. This eradication program worked, by 1952, the US was declared free of malaria. Anyone in the US who is now diagnosed with malaria has usually caught the disease while abroad.
Malaria in Africa — the country of Eritrea.
It seems that the country of Eritrea is having some success in reducing malaria deaths by eradicating the Anopheles mosquito species. Since 2003 the government has been distributing pesticide treated mosquito nets and making sure that these nets are retreated every three months. Mosquito friendly habitats have been eradicated – changed so that the mosquito can no longer reproduce. The setting up of local medical clinics where people can be treated for malaria quickly has also been a great help. The malaria mortality rate has been reduced by 85 percent.
Remember that where-ever in the world the malaria mosquito species can survive and multiply it is possible to have an outbreak of malaria.
Pharmaceutical Drugs.
Pharmaceutical drugs are the usual method to treat cases of malaria. Following are some of the anti-malarial drugs used in the treatment of uncomplicated malaria.
* Amodiaquine,
* Clindamycin,
* Halofantrine,
* Lumefantrine plus Artemether (Coartem),
* Mefloquine plus Artesunate,
* Sulfadoxine Pyrimethamine plus Artesunate,
* Sulfadoxine pyrimethamine,
* Quinine,
* Tetracycline,
All pharmaceutical drugs, when taken, have the possibility of causing adverse side effects. Here are the possible unwanted side effects of Tetracycline.
The side effects associated with Tetracycline are; blurred vision, diarrhea, dizziness, genital or anal sores, loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting, anemia, blood disorders, sore tongue, inflammation of the small and large intestines, noises in ears, fluid retention, hives, painful and difficult to swallow food, feeling dizzy, skin rash and increased sensitivity to bright lights.
Quinine.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, in 2006, banned the use of all but one brand of Quinine (Qualaquin) because of adverse side effects. Some of the usual side effects of taking Quinine are; diarrhea, chest pain, a pounding heart, blistered skin, cessation of urination, loss of hearing, blurred vision, yellow skin, stomach upset, nausea, vomiting, general weakness, mental confusion and purple spots under the skin.
More serious quinine side effects are; cardiac arrhythmias, thrombocytopenia (a decrease in blood platelets that can cause hemorrhage or clotting problems), severe hypersensitivity reactions and death. From 1969 to 2006 there were 93 reports, made to the FDA, of people dying from taking quinine.
Following are some pharmaceutical drugs used to prevent malaria.
* Atovaquone proguanil,
* Chloroquine,
* Doxycycline,
* Mefloquine,
* Primaquine,
Here is a list of the possible adverse side effects of the drug Chloroquine.
Diarrhea, blurred vision, sore throat, loss of hearing, hives, swollen tongue, swollen lips, noises in the ears, itching, breathing difficulties, seizures, averse to sunlight, bruising, bleeding with no obvious reason, loss of hair, unusual emotional behaviour, loss of appetite, headache, nausea, vomiting and cramps in stomach.
The above three examples show that whatever pharmaceutical drug you take for malaria you should be aware that you may suffer from some adverse side effects.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) state on their website: “In general, most drugs used to prevent and treat malaria have been shown to be well tolerated for at least one year or more”. – In other words most of the drugs taken by most of the people will not cause side effects for up to one year. After one year you can expect to suffer some unwanted side effects. – Which probably explains why people who live in areas where malaria disease is rife do not usually take the preventative malaria medicines, as side effects always develop over time. Those few who do take the preventative drugs often need hospitalisation.
Most people, who live in high infestation areas, depend upon being cured by the standard malaria medicines after they contract malaria.
Drug Resistance.
The use of anti-malarial drugs over time has another negative effect – drug resistance. Two of the four parasite species that have developed some resistance to some of the above drugs are Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax. So if you are infected with either of these two species the drugs you are taking may not be effective in curing your malaria unless they have been tested in a laboratory and found to be effective in treating these two species.
Yeast Extract.
There is a yeast extract, a by-product of the beer brewing process, that if eaten on a daily basis is reported, by those who eat it, to reduce the number of mosquitoes bites. The theory is that the yeast extract changes your body odour so that you are less attractive to the mosquitoes. Definitely worth trying and you get the bonus of getting extra B vitamins.
The yeast extract I am referring to is Marmite. There are other yeast extracts such as Vegemite from Australia and Cenovis made in Switzerland, plus many copycats. The people I know start to eat Marmite two weeks before their journey when going to Africa. I do not know if the other yeast extracts will have the same effect.
A Simple Safe Malaria Treatment.
While prospecting for gold in the jungles of Guyana, South America in 1997, Jim Humble accidentally discovered a simple cure for malaria. Two members of the prospecting group went down with malaria disease and there was no malaria medicine available. Help was six days away. The only thing they had was a substance called stabilized oxygen that Jim used to sterilise water. Jim reckoned that as stabilized oxygen kills pathogens in water it seemed logical to assume that it might kill the malaria parasite.
The two men lay in their hammocks shivering from the chills while at the same time they were running high fevers. Their symptoms of malaria included headaches, aching muscles and joints, nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting.
They felt so bad that when Jim asked them if they were willing to try his – health drink from America – they agreed. Jim gave each man a healthy dose of stabilized oxygen in some water. In one hour the shivering had stopped and the men looked better. Four hours later all the malaria symptoms had gone and they got out from their hammocks and ate a meal.
Throughout his travels in the jungle he treated other people with the stabilized oxygen with some success. Overall the success rate was seven out of ten people were helped.
Thus started Jim’s journey to try and discover why the stabilized oxygen only worked for some of the time and if he could increase the success rate.
For six years from 2001 to 2006 Jim carried out thousands of tests both on himself and other volunteers. In all 75,000 people from five different countries agreed to try Jim’s malaria treatment. Slowly with much trial and error the success rate improved until the year 2006 when Jim considered that his malaria treatment was fully tested and ready to be used by all malaria sufferers.
Jim has written an eBook called “The Miracle Mineral Solution of the 21st Century” it is in two parts. The first part can be downloaded for free and there is a small charge for part two. If you have malaria part one of the eBook, chapters eight and nine, will give you all the information you need to treat yourself using Jim’s treatment protocol.
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