The reports out of West Africa have a lot of people worried about becoming the real-life versions of the extras from Outbreak. With a high mortality rate and scary symptoms, Ebola is one dangerous disease—but is it something that you need to fear?
You can rest assured. According to the Centers for Disease Control, Ebola doesn’t pose a significant risk to people in the U.S. There have been few confirmed cases outside of Guinea, Nigeria, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, and the virus is not spread through casual contact.
“There has to be direct contact with body fluid—it doesn’t go through the air,” says Joseph Vinetz, M.D., a professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at the University of California, San Diego.
As long as your travels keep you away from an infected person’s blood, urine, saliva, or other secretions, you don’t have to worry much about Ebola. But what diseases should you be concerned about contracting on your next international trip? Here are 5 tropical illnesses that can mess you up quicker than Ebola.
This mosquito-spread virus became a newsmaker late last year, when it was confirmed to have spread to the Caribbean for the first time. Before that, the virus had been found in countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Cases are rising: So far in 2014, there were 636 cases reported in U.S. residents returning from travel, up from an average of only 28 cases per year from 2006 through 2013. The mosquitoes that transmit the virus are buzzing their way around the world—and the population is growing while they’re on they move. “There’s a critical mass of them,” says Dr. Vinetz. “The range of viral infection has expanded along with the mosquitoes.”
You’re most at risk to contract the virus during the daytime, since that’s when the mosquitos tend to bite. About three to seven days after the bloodsucker bites, you may develop a fever—usually 102°F or higher—and feel joint or muscle pain and headache.
There’s no treatment besides supportive care for this painful virus, though people usually feel better within a week. A vaccine is in the works, but until then, the only way to prevent Chikungunya is to avoid mosquito bites. Try using an insect repellant with DEET or picaridin.
This bacterial disease can occur worldwide, but it’s most common in countries with humid or subtropical climates, such as those in Asia, South America, and the Caribbean. It’s spread through the urine of infected animals, which can seep into the water and put you at risk if you go in for a dip.
According to a review in the Journal of Travel Medicine, adventure travelers engaging in activities like freshwater swimming, rafting, kayaking, canoeing, fishing, and trail biking are the most likely victims. If you’re an outdoor water enthusiast, take preventive measures by avoiding submersion in river water, wearing waterproof clothing, and covering up any cuts on the skin to reduce your risk of exposure. (Be extra careful if you’re going into the water after it rains—the risk of infection rises.)
If your preventive efforts bombed, you’ll know it anywhere from two days to three weeks afterwards. That’s when you’d come down with a range of symptoms including high fever, headache, chills, muscle aches, vomiting, and diarrhea. If you’re really unlucky, you may be one of the up to 10 percent who get a severe form of the disease, which can cause jaundice, kidney failure, and—gulp—hemorrhage.
“It looks like the Ebola virus,” says Dr. Vinetz. But the bleeding can be even worse. “People start coughing up massive amounts of blood and die.” There’s no vaccine, but leptospirosis can be treated—usually with the antibiotics doxycycline for milder cases and penicillin for more severe ones.
This disease is common in the developing world, especially in south Asia. In 2011, 303 U.S. residents were sickened with typhoid after traveling—69 percent after returning from India, and 8 percent after trips to both Bangladesh and Pakistan. People with the disease, or who are carriers, shed the bacteria Salmonella Typhi in their stool.
Without proper hand washing, they can contaminate any food or drink they’re preparing. So if they’re the ones behind the counter serving your dinner, you can become infected.
Avoid the riskiest places to chow down: street carts or other informal places. You can also protect yourself by getting the typhoid vaccine before traveling to a country where the disease is common, but it’s only about 70 percent effective, Dr. Vinetz says, so you’ll still want to make smart food choices to stay safe.
Many of the symptoms of typhoid are nonspecific—a fever that can reach as high as 104°F, headache, and loss of appetite. If they last more than a couple of days, that can be indicative of typhoid, so make an appointment with an infectious disease doctor. You’ll be treated with antibiotics.
Like Chikungunya, mosquitoes are the carriers, but in this instance they’re transmitting a parasite in their bite. Malaria occurs in tropical and subtropical areas where the specific mosquitoes thrive, such as Africa, South America, and the South Pacific. People with the disease generally feel very sick, with high fevers, chills, and flu-like symptoms.
And it’s a very real worry for travelers. In 2011, there were 1,920 cases of travel-related malaria diagnosed in U.S. residents. That was a 40-year high according to the CDC, probably due to increases in international travel and insufficient preventive measures.
One way to stay safe? Ask your doctor about taking a medication to protect yourself from the disease, says Dr. Vinetz. Some options include Malarone and doxycycline, though which meds you’ll take depends on where you’re going and how long you’ll be there. And on your trip, make sure to use DEET-containing insect repellant and sleep under bed nets—these mosquitoes only bite at night.
If you think you’re infected, ask your doctor to perform a blood test to confirm. Malaria can be treated with prescription drugs, but it’s important to get started on them early on.
Parasitic worms are what’s responsible for sickening you with this tongue-twisting tropical disease that has both acute and chronic effects. A rash might be your first clue, followed by fever, chills, cough, and muscle aches a month or so later. Chronic symptoms include abdominal pain, blood in the urine or stool, and problems passing urine.
It’s particularly common in tourist-heavy areas like Sub-Saharan Africa, Lake Malawi, Lake Victoria, the Nile River, and parts of Brazil. What happens is the parasite breeds inside a freshwater snail, and then is released into the water where it looks for a human host to invade. Even scarier is you don’t have to swallow them to get sick.
“Those parasites can go through intact, normal skin,” says Dr. Vinetz. Prescription drugs like Praziquantel can banish the wily worms, but it’s best to prevent infection in the first place. Stay safe by avoiding any kind of skin contact with freshwater in places where the disease is common. According to a study in Emerging Infectious Diseases, 17 percent of people who kayaked and white-water rafted in the Nile in Uganda showed evidence of the disease.