Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
close window
Housecall Archives
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
close window
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Prevention
By Mayo Clinic staffCholera cases reported in the United States since 1995 have been traced to sources outside the U.S. or to contaminated and improperly cooked seafood from the Gulf Coast waters.
If you're traveling to cholera-endemic areas, your risk of contracting the disease is extremely low if you follow these precautions:
- Wash your hands. Frequent hand washing is the best way to control cholera infection. Wash your hands thoroughly with hot, soapy water, especially before eating or preparing food, after using the toilet, and when you return from public places. Carry an alcohol-based hand sanitizer for times when water isn't available.
- Avoid untreated water. Contaminated drinking water is the most common source of cholera infection. For that reason, drink only bottled water or water you've boiled or disinfected yourself. Coffee, tea and other hot beverages, as well as bottled or canned soft drinks, wine and beer, are generally safe. Carefully wipe the outside of all bottles and cans before you open them and ask for drinks without ice. Use bottled water to brush your teeth.
- Eat food that's completely cooked and hot. Cholera bacteria can survive on room temperature food for up to five days and aren't destroyed by freezing. It's best to avoid street vendor food, but if you do buy it, make sure your meal is cooked in your presence and served hot.
- Avoid sushi. Don't eat raw or improperly cooked fish and seafood of any kind.
- Be careful with fruits and vegetables. When you're traveling, make sure that all fruits and vegetables that you eat are cooked or have thick skins that you peel yourself. Avoid lettuce in particular because it may have been rinsed in contaminated water.
- Be wary of dairy foods. Avoid ice cream, which is often contaminated, and unpasteurized milk.
- Cholera vaccine. Because travelers have a low risk of contracting cholera and because the traditional injected vaccine offers minimal protection, no cholera vaccine is currently available in the United States. A few countries offer two oral vaccines that may provide longer and better immunity than the older versions did. If you'd like more information about these vaccines, contact your doctor or local office of public health. Keep in mind that no country requires immunization against cholera as a condition for entry.
References
- Cholera. World Health Organization. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs107/en/. Accessed Feb. 19, 2009.
- Cholera. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/dfbmd/disease_listing/cholera_gi.html. Accessed Feb. 19, 2009.
- Cholera. The Merck Manuals: The Merck Manual for Healthcare Professionals. http://www.merck.com/mmpe/sec14/ch173/ch173e.html. Accessed Feb. 19, 2009.
- Butterton JR. Approach to the patient with Vibrio cholerae infection. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Feb. 19, 2009.
- Menon MP, et al. Vibrio cholerae (Cholera). In: Long SS, et al., eds. Long: Principles and Practice of Pediatric Infectious Diseases. 3rd ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Churchill Livingstone Elsevier; 2008:844.
- Seas C, et al. Vibrio cholerae. In: Mandell GL, et al. Mandell, Bennett, & Dolin: Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases. 6th ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Churchill Livingstone Elsevier; 2005:2536.
