By May Wong, Channel NewsAsia

SINGAPORE - [CHANNELNEWSASIA]: Many Singaporeans do not take appropriate health precautions before travelling overseas.

This is according to a survey involving some 500 travellers conducted by GlaxoSmithKline, a major pharmaceutical company.

Getting vaccinated is often far from the minds of Singaporeans when they travel overseas, the survey found.

Only 43 percent would get vaccinated before going abroad.

The survey findings showed that 4 in 10 respondents believed their travel destinations are safe from diseases.

But doctors say travellers must be made aware of travel-related health risks.

Dr Annelies Wilder-Smith from the Travellers' Health & Vaccination Centre at Tan Tock Seng Hospital said: "These issues need to be addressed. Family general practitioners as well as the media have the responsibility in educating about travel-related health risks.

"In addition, I believe that employers sending their employees on overseas business travel have responsibility and obligation to increase awareness about these risks. They should encourage pre-travel advice, travel vaccinations as well as other precautions.

"The traveller may import diseases back to Singapore and this may put their close contacts, family members at higher risk."

Fortunately for Sunny Ong, his employer sent him to get his vaccinations to prevent diseases like Typhoid.

"I'm here to get vaccinations because for my business trip to South Africa. The reason why I took the jabs is for the safety of my health. I heard there are risks of yellow fever, bird flu many other diseases. So the jabs are for my safety," said Ong.

Another who wants to make sure that he doesn't fall ill during his upcoming holiday is a 77-year-old grandfather.

"I'm taking influenza jab because I'm planning to go to Hong Kong. I've got a history of bronchitis and I catch colds easily," said the 77-year-old Joseph Soh.

Last year, about 22,000 patients visited the clinic at Tan Tock Seng Hospital to get their vaccinations. The common vaccinations include prevention against Influenza and Hepatitis A.

Doctors recommend that travellers get their vaccinations about two to four weeks before going overseas.

"Recently, I had a case where a patient came to the travel clinic to have the typhoid fever vaccine and various others. But this patient left for his trip the very next day and returned 10 days later with typhoid fever. The message here is that he came too late. It does take some time for the vaccines to build up anti-bodies," explained Dr Wilder-Smith.

It is believed that up to 50 percent of travellers who visit developing countries suffer from food poisoning. And that can easily be prevented with proper vaccinations.

- CNA /ls