Miles Pharmacy Blog

Vaccines protect travellers from serious diseases. Depending on where you travel, you may come into contact with diseases such as yellow fever, malaria, and typhoid that are rare in first-world countries like Europe and America. Some vaccines may also be required for you to travel to certain places.

Cholera is a bacterial infection caused by contaminated food or water. Typhoid is also a bacterial infection spread through contaminated food and water, usually caused by poor sanitation and lack of cleanliness such as not washing hands and clothes.

Cervical cancer caused the death of 854 women in the UK from 2016 to 2018. This dreaded disease remains one of the most prevalent forms of cancer in the country.

Hepatitis A is a liver infection caused by a virus which is spread via an infected person’s faeces. Hepatitis A is not a common disease in the UK but there are certain groups of people at increased risk and these include men who have sex with men and drug users who inject drugs. There is a vaccination for Hepatitis A including a vaccination for Hepatitis A for children who would normally be considered at a much lower risk of the disease unless they are travelling to parts of the world where there is poor sanitation and food hygiene.

If you travel to certain parts of the world where there are endemic diseases like cholera and typhoid, then there are recommended vaccines depending on your destination and length of stay. Miles Pharmacy runs a travel clinic in Epsom which covers all the travel vaccinations you will need for different locations around the world including the rabies vaccine with up-to-date protocols and guidance on how to stay safe.

Cholera is a horrible illness that will spoil your day and travel plans. It causes severe diarrhoea which can become very serious if it is not treated with rehydration, intravenous fluids and antibiotics. To avoid the risk of cholera infection, have the cholera vaccinewhich is available as part of our travel vaccinations service in Epsom.

Meningococcal disease is caused by the meningococcal bacteria and results in four strains of the illness known as A, C, W and Y. The ACWY vaccine protects against all four types of meningitis and is available at our Travel vaccinations clinic in Epsom.

Cholera is easily caught by eating food and drinking water which is contaminated with the bacteria, Vibrio Cholerae. and it spreads like wildfire.  Locations with poor sanitation or developing nations struggling with war or famine are common locations for outbreaks of cholera.

Rabies is a viral disease usually passed from an infected animal to a human via a scratch or bite.  When most people think of rabies they tend to think of dogs but rabies is also quite common in cats, cattle, monkeys, foxes and bats too.  Rabies is everywhere (although not in the UK) but is most common in Asia, Central and South America and Africa.

Before you go abroad, it is important to make sure you have everything ticked off your ‘to do’ list. But it’s not just renewing your passport, collecting foreign currency and packing your suitcase that you need to think about. Making time for your holiday vaccinations is also important.