Staying Safe Abroad – Reason or Paranoia?

March 4, 2009 - PRLog -- To coincide with the online publication of “Holiday and Travel Security Handbook” – a book providing advice on staying safe when abroad – HowTo.co.uk takes a look at whether the risks abroad are real or exaggerated.

Every year, 430 million people travel abroad for leisure. They look to all manner of guidebooks, websites and experts for advice on how to stay safe while travelling. The problem is, thanks to a climate of fear that has grown up in the West, the risks are exaggerated to them. Very often the worst case scenario is presented as a likely happening, which has more to do with the guidebooks’ fear of getting sued if they don’t cover every possibility, than any genuine risk. All this can curtail a traveller’s enjoyment with unnecessary worries.

Personal safety

While crime is a fact of all human societies, it is often more serious and widespread in the ‘First World’ than in the poorer countries that attract Western tourism. You are more likely to be robbed on the street or raped in the US, Canada and the UK than in most politically-stable Asian countries. If you find yourself lost on the streets of a major Indian city - as I have - people will normally bend over backwards to help you. I doubt that you’d find the same hospitality in the knife and gun crime hotspots of London or New York.

Food safety

Guidebooks such as Lonely Planet and Rough Guide warn against eating salads abroad because they claim that the fruit and vegetables are washed in untreated water. This is in fact rare, as not even local people can stomach untreated water. Eateries that systematically poisoned their customers, whether in Dhaka or Dorking, would quickly go out of business.

There is a popular myth that upscale restaurants are safer, but despite their appearance of cleanliness, food can be left out at the mercy of pests. Perhaps  but never from street food freshly cooked before my eyes, even if it was over a bonfire of rubbish and there were rats scurrying around.

Disease

While mosquito-borne diseases are a real threat to travellers, there is much misinformation about them. In many well-populated tourist areas, the risk of malaria is so small that it isn’t worth spending a fortune on prophylactics which may also have nasty side-effects. Elsewhere, take all advised precautions.


Insurance

Travel insurance won’t cover you for everything, so make sure you read the policy you’re signing up for carefully. Competition between rival companies is so intense that premiums are cut back to a minimum.  This in turn means that there is a growing reluctance to pay out on claims. 19-year-old James Pinnington, who bought the most expensive travel insurance he could find, had a moped accident in Thailand recently and was unable to claim because the small print stated that he should have owned a UK driving licence. The company later apologised for omitting this detail from the ‘Key Facts’ booklet he was given. Pinnington had to pay £25,000 in medical fees.

Don’t Believe (All) The Hype

So travellers shouldn’t believe all the hype about the dangers abroad. Rather than trusting in just one book they should seek second opinions and different viewpoints. The pleasure and enlightenment of travel shouldn’t be ruined by a stomach ulcer.

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