Health

Staying healthy
Water is clean and safe to drink in major cities on the peninsula but in other areas it should be boiled or sterilized. Mineral water can be bought fairly easily. With food, normal precautions should be taken with shellfish; ensure stall food is properly cooked and avoid unpeeled fruits

Intestinal upsets
Practically nobody escapes intestinal infections, so be prepared for them. Most of the time they are due to the insanitary preparation of food. Do not eat uncooked fish vegetables or meat (especially pork),fruit without the skin (always peel fruit yourself food that is exposed to flies (particularly salads).Tap water may be unsafe, especially the monsoon seasons and the same goes for stream water or well water. Filtered or bottled water is usually available and safe but you cannot always rely on It. Lf your has a central hot water supply, this is safe to drink after cooling. Ice should be made from boiled water but rarely is, so stand your glass on the ice cubes instead of putting them the drink. Dirty water should be strained through a filter bag (available from car: shops),then boiled or treated. Bringing the water to a rolling boll at sea level is sufficient.

In the highlands, you have to boil the water a bit longer to ensure that all the microbes are killed (because water boils at a lower temperature at altitude). Various sterilizing methods can be used and there are proprietary preparations containing, chlorine or iodine compounds Pasteurized or heat-treated milk is now fairly widely available as is cream and yoghurt produced by the same methods. Unpasteurized milk product including cheese, are sources of tuberculosis, brucellosis, listeria and food poisoning germs. You can render fresh milk safe by heating it to 62°Cfor 30 mins followed by rapid cooling or by boiling Matured or processed cheeses are safer than fresh varieties.

Fish and shellfish are popular foods throughout island Southeast Asia but can be the source of health problems. Shellfish which are eaten raw will transmit poisoning or hepatitis if they have been living in contaminated water.

Certain accumulatetoxlnsintheirbodiesatcertalntlmesoftheyear,whichgiveriseto when they are eaten. The phenomenon known as 'red tide' can also affect fish and shellfish which eat large quantities of tiny sea creatures and thereby become poisonous. The only way to guard against this is to keep as well informed as possible about fish and shellfish quality in the area you are visiting. Most countries impose a ban on fishing in periods when red tide is prevalent, although this is often flouted.

Diarrhoea
Diarrhoe is usually the result of food poisoning, but can occasionally result from contaminated water There are various causes - viruses, bacteria, protozoa ( amoeba), salmonella and cholera organisms. It may take one of several forms coming on suddenly or rather slowly. It may be accompanied by vomiting or severe abdominal pain, and the passage of blood or mucus (when it is called dysentery).

All kinds of diarrhoea, whether or not accompanied by vomiting, respond favourably to the replacement of water and salts taken as frequent small sips of some kind of rehydration solution. There are proprietary preparations consisting of sachets of oral rehydration electrolyte powder which are dissolved in water, or make up your own by adding half a teaspoonful of salt (3.5 grams) and 4 tablespoons of sugar 40 Gram) to a litre of boiled water. If it is possible to time the onset of diarrhoea to the .hen it is probably viral or bacterial and/or the onset of dysentery. The u in addition to rehydration is Ciprofloxacin (500 mgs every 12 hrs). The drug widely available as are various similar ones.

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