5 Tips to Avoid Getting Sick on a Family Vacation

It is Spring Break time! And it is also almost summer break. Time for traveling! When you are away from home, the last thing you want to do is worry about your health.

Dr. Yael Halaas is a board certified ENT. She has been quoted in US Weekly, Men’s Fitness, Prevention & Fitness Magazine, and shared with 5 Minutes for Parenting some wonderful tips for staying healthy as you travel. 

1. Sanitize everything!  One of the first ways to ruin a vacation together is catching a cold on the plane. Carry antibacterial wipes and wipe down every surface you may touch on the plane. Wipe the belt buckle, food tray and latch, volume control, and armrests. The airline crew cannot clean all these surfaces between flights which can harbor contagious viruses and bacteria.

 2. Wash your hands– especially before touching your own or a loved one’s eyes, nose or mouth. When traveling, it is impossible to avoid contact with surfaces that many others may have touched. To avoid those bugs contaminating your family, wash your hands.

 3. Be proactive-  On family vacations with everyone close together, take Cold-EEZE at the first sign of a cold to shorten the duration, minimizing the amount of time you are sick to better enjoy your vacation. Cold-EEZE zinc lozenges have been found to decrease the duration of colds by nearly half in studies by Dartmouth Medical Center and the Cleveland Clinic. Also, by shortening your cold, it minimizes the chances of spreading the cold onto your family members.

 4. Be prepared– Carry medications with you to minimize the impact of a cold or illness so you can all still enjoy your trip. Useful medications include analgesia like Tylenol or allergy medications for adults and children. Adults may also want to have some decongestants handy just in case.

 5. Be healthy–  Good hydration, good nutrition and exercise go a long way to giving the body the support it needs to stay strong.

What are your tips for staying healthy as you travel? 

16 Responses to 5 Tips to Avoid Getting Sick on a Family Vacation
  1. Debbye
    March 24, 2012 | 11:36 am

    Great photo! Thank you for the tips! I knew my husband and I were truly meant to be on our very first weekend getaway together. He brought antibacterial wipes and the very first thing he did as we stepped into our hotel room was sanitize everything!!! A man of my own heart, and this article is an article of my own heart! Thanks for making me feel less crazy for being diligent about germs!

    • Greta Novak
      May 16, 2012 | 6:57 am

      I can picture the antibacterial wipes scene… LOL… this would be also of my own heart!

      • Debbye
        May 16, 2012 | 11:20 am

        Romantic right??? LOL

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    April 18, 2012 | 6:13 am

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  6. sms
    April 23, 2012 | 2:52 am

    These tips is very important for our family,I like to share it to may friends.Thank for sharing this.

  7. Shelly
    January 23, 2013 | 9:44 pm

    Thanks for these tips—great for flu season! My family was staying in a hotel recently and I got OCD thoughts everytime I saw my kids crawling under the beds and trying to hide under the bathroom sink!

  8. Ilene J. Witt
    May 17, 2013 | 5:31 am

    Although you probably won’t get influenza from pressing an elevator button or using a keyboard that a sick person has handled, you could catch a cold, since that virus is mainly passed around by touch. So it’s smart to clean shared telephones and laptops with a disinfecting wipe. Also, like Mom said, wash your hands! Soap up or use an alcohol-based sanitizer, especially before you eat or touch your eyes, nose or face, and after you’ve been in the bathroom.

  9. Reed O. Benson
    June 9, 2013 | 9:27 pm

    4. Be prepared- Carry medications with you to minimize the impact of a cold or illness so you can all still enjoy your trip. Useful medications include analgesia like Tylenol or allergy medications for adults and children. Adults may also want to have some decongestants handy just in case.

  10. Corinne Horne
    June 27, 2013 | 9:00 pm

    Because oral herpes is so common, it is diagnosed primarily by symptoms. It can be diagnosed and treated by the family doctor, dermatologists (doctors who specialize in skin diseases) and infectious disease specialists. Laboratory tests may be performed to look for the virus. Because healing sores do not shed much virus, a sample from an open sore would be taken for viral culture. A sterile cotton swab would be wiped over open sores and the sample used to infect human cells in culture. Cells that are killed by the herpes virus have a certain appearance under microscopic examination. The results of this test are available within two to 10 days.

  11. David I. Williams
    July 3, 2013 | 5:12 am

    The common cold is caused by a virus. There are over 200 different viruses that can cause a cold.

  12. Harlan Chambers
    July 7, 2013 | 1:44 pm

    A cold is an upper respiratory infection caused by any one of hundreds of different viruses. Unfortunately, scientists haven’t figured out how to wipe out these viruses. The body has to rely on its own natural defenses.During a cold, virus particles penetrate the mucous layer of the nose and throat and attach themselves to cells there. The viruses punch holes in the cell membranes, allowing viral genetic material to enter the cells.

  13. Dean Patterson
    July 26, 2013 | 3:12 pm

    One of the first ways to ruin a vacation together is catching a cold on the plane. Carry antibacterial wipes and wipe down every surface you may touch on the plane. Wipe the belt buckle, food tray and latch, volume control, and armrests. The airline crew cannot clean all these surfaces between flights which can harbor contagious viruses and bacteria.

  14. get smart
    August 23, 2013 | 6:14 am

    4. Be prepared – Carry medications with you to minimize the impact of a cold or illness so you can all still enjoy your trip. Useful medications include analgesia like Tylenol or allergy medications for adults and children. Adults may also want to have some decongestants handy just in case.

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