The most pressing infectious disease risks for individuals traveling to tropical countries

Somia Iqtadar, MD, is an associate professor of medicine at King Edward Medical University, Pakistan, and chairperson of the Dengue Expert Advisory Group. Her areas of interest include cardiometabolic medicine and infectious diseases.

What are the most pressing infectious disease risks for individuals traveling to tropical countries, both among diseases preventable by vaccination and other conditions?

Somia Iqtadar, MD: The most pressing infectious disease risks for travelers are related to either vector-borne diseases or food- and water-borne diseases. Among the vector-borne diseases we have malaria and dengue, and among the food-borne we have typhoid fever, hepatitis A, and there is also risk of yellow fever in certain African countries.

While vaccination remains one of the important strategies for preventive measures, it is important to know other mitigation strategies like vector-control measures, using of insect repellents, a bed net; it's also very important.

Water and food hygiene practices while traveling are of utmost importance if you want to prevent such infections. All travelers must consult their travel medicine experts so that they can take appropriate steps and they can be counseled about potential risk of infections in certain destinations.

They should be counseled about prophylactic measures like we can take malaria prophylaxis, some vaccinations are also available for dengue, for yellow fever, for hepatitis A, for typhoid [fever], and this should be well before time so that there is enough time for the immune response to build before they travel. Such practices help the travelers in having safe journeys.

Additionally, travelers should be aware of the emerging infectious diseases and the health authorities’ recommendations in that particular area, and for this, travel medicine experts are the best persons to go to.