Food
Avoid getting sick on your Western travels
By JOHN MARIANI
Has anyone watched that horrifying new show on the Animal Planet network entitled Monsters Inside Me, which shows highly graphic images of how all those nasty bugs, worms, and bacteria wend their icky way through our bodies? If you haven't, don't. At least not before your next trip. Or you'll probably never go out of the house again. Especially to western deserts, Gulf waters, and Central and South America. Better you should be bitten by a scorpion.
Don't get bugged during your Western travels.
As someone who for more than three decades has traveled the West and the rest of the world, I have only been downed by a stomach bug twice — both times due to shellfish. My doctor says I've probably built up an immunity to most everything over all those years, but I take very specific precautions when dining out in exotic places, and even when I'm just traveling in the U.S.
Here's what I recommend and what I do (be sure to also check with your own doctor):
1. Before a meal, take the recommended dosage of Pepto-Bismol. I remember reading in some Texas medical health magazine that it coats the stomach lining and is effective at keeping the wild things at bay. Seems to work for me. I travel often to Mexico, and Montezuma has yet to exact his revenge.
2. When you arrive at your destination, eat some of the local yogurt, whose healthy bacteria can help your body acclimatize and ward off the bad bacteria.
3. You've heard it before, but you cannot hear it enough: Do not eat any raw fruits or vegetables that may have been washed in water, including salad greens. You should peel all fresh fruits and vegetables yourself. As appealing as a peeled-mango-on-a-stick may be on a tropical afternoon, you don't know how long it has been sitting in the open air (or what has been sitting on it). Certain fruits that you must eat peel-and-all, like strawberries, raspberries, and grapes, should never be considered safe.
4. The old prohibition to avoid drinking the local water entirely is not quite as urgent as it once was in cities south of the border, but before I drink it, I always ask the hotel or restaurant if their water is filtered. If you stay at a first-class hotel or resort, the odds are they purify their water to very tough, high standards. And don't forget — the water you rinse with after you brush your teeth needs to be filtered, too.
5. Wine and beer (okay, bottled soft drinks, too) are the best alternatives to water. But hold the ice — there is no guarantee it has been made from purified water.
6. Ask your doctor for a prescription drug to fight bacterial infections and diarrhea. And, to prepare for all possibilities, carry pills to fight traveler's constipation.
7. Stay away from raw shellfish. And I don't think that ceviches (which are simply raw fish "cooked" in lime juice) are all that great an idea either. If you're going to come down with something, these are the likely prospects.
8. Eat hot foods hot and cold foods cold. And be wary of those room-temperature sauces — diarrhea-causing bacteria can multiply in foods that are allowed to cool or warm to room temperature.
9. Wash your hands — every chance you get. Those bacterial hand washes are a good thing to carry, too.
10. Even if you yearn to be an adventurous eater like Anthony Bourdain, for the first few days stick close to your normal diet and food preferences until your system gets used to the new foods.
11. Get a copy of The Travel Doctor by Mark Wise, M.D., which treats many of these problems in depth, as well as provides advice on what to do when you come home a bit worse for wear.
12. Last, don't eat street foods, as wonderful as they look and smell. What is perfectly healthy for the locals to eat is not always good for you.
Issue: October 2009
