Can you still buy Cipro in Coz w/o seeing a dr there?

[DandyDon]

Eggs in their shell will keep for a long, long time, refrigerated or not. Their freshness will vary and the effect that will have on the cooking. The air sac size changes with age affecting hard boiled eggs' yolk placement. Not the quality of the egg. Every tienda sells unfriegerated eggs and they sit there until they are sold. No problemo. It's not until the safety of the shell is compromised that eggs become a health issue.

How much are eggs washed before sale in Mexico? I guess they must be some or they would be pretty ugly. Enough to remove the protective film - and salmonella?

I once had a flock of ducks and I loved their tasty eggs, too gamey for some but I liked them - yet they only laid in the summer. I'd wash the eggs well, then coat in Crisco maybe (it's been decades so I may have some of this wrong), store them in dated boxes in a closet all winter, eating oldest first if they did not float - no problems.

Packaged eggs I buy here I know are well washed, but I don't know how old they are when I buy them at this little market, and they may sit in my fridge for several weeks before I get to the last - so test them in water to see if they float, discarding those that float.

The only case of TD I've ever experienced was after eating Chinese food in Los Alamo NM, home to the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which was founded to undertake the Manhattan Project. Something like 6 to 12 runs back to the privy as we were trying to check out. It self limited fast enough altho I was dehydrated and too weak to climb the ruins we went to next.

 

[Belmont]

I've taken care of any E.coli problem with a vaccine: Dukoral.
It also protects against cholera.

 

[MMM]

How much are eggs washed before sale in Mexico? I guess they must be some or they would be pretty ugly. Enough to remove the protective film - and salmonella?

Local tiendas may buy from the guy down the street. My friend gives me eggs from her hens; I wash off the feathers and any other gunk but that's about it.

 

[Blue Sparkle]

Eggs in their shell will keep for a long, long time, refrigerated or not.

Agreed, but I was just saying that I found never-refrigerated eggs to keep even longer that those that came from refrigeration out into the hot cruel world. Un-washed and never-refrigerated were the best.

Every tienda sells unfriegerated eggs and they sit there until they are sold. No problemo.

Yes, it was great to get to Mexico where it was easy to find never-refrigerated eggs (not so easy in the US and Canada unless I found a farm type place).

It's not until the safety of the shell is compromised that eggs become a health issue.

I have had some go bad (after a month or more), even without the shell ever having been compromised. So it is possible. (Well, depending on how you define "compromised," as air is often what does it -- but I took you to mean cracked or opened shells.)

Now this is even further off-topic, but when trying to keep eggs for as long as possible sans refrigeration, the thing is to keep air from penetrating the shell. There are various methods that sailors use. One is to coat the outside of each egg's shell in Vaseline; another is to use "water glass" (liquid sodium silicate); a third is to boil them very briefly (this sets a tiny bit of the outer white), and a fourth (the one I used) is to simply turn them once every few days (this keeps the shell coated from the inside). I would keep them in those plastic "dozen" camping holders and then just turn each of the dozens all at once in its holder.

After a while the white and the yolk become less distinct (they start to "blend"), but the eggs are still usable.

Okay, probably more than anyone wanted to know, and I hope I have not put anyone to sleep.

And of course as someone pointed out above, if you have refrigeration, and space in the 'fridge, then you don't need all the old "tricks"

 

[Belmont]

How about eggs the Filipino way: Balut

 

[swamp diver]

I've taken care of any E.coli problem with a vaccine: Dukoral.
It also protects against cholera.

Yes but I don't think it is available in the US yet. The oral vaccine is now available over the counter in Ontario without a prescription for $80 for the two doses.

Only thing is the effectiveness depending on which study is examined is in the ballpark of 40 to 60 percent for traveler's diarrhea but that is a decent reduction in the risk for TD especially when in countries where the relative risk is that much higher.

Vaccination with Dukoral against travelers' diarrh... [Expert Rev Vaccines. 2008] - PubMed result

 

[ggunn]

I've taken care of any E.coli problem with a vaccine: Dukoral.
It also protects against cholera.

IANAD, but isn't the definition of a vaccine a solution of serum antibodies against a specific organism? Flu vaccines are even specific to certain strains of the same organism. If that is so, unless the same bug causes both illnesses, how could a single vaccine protect against both of them?

 

[swamp diver]

IANAD, but isn't the definition of a vaccine a solution of serum antibodies against a specific organism? Flu vaccines are even specific to certain strains of the same organism. If that is so, unless the same bug causes both illnesses, how could a single vaccine protect against both of them?

No it is usually a portion of the pathogen that has been inactivated in most cases (there are live viral vaccines) which tricks the body into forming an immune response against the pathogen without causing disease. In most cases that response involves the specific production of antibodies against the pathogen in question. The next time the body is exposed to the real pathogen it will generate what is called an anamnestic response where thinking it has been exposed to the pathogen previously the body produces large quantities of antibody against the bacteria or virus in question.

Part of that vaccine-induced immune response may be general and part is specific such as formation of specific antibodies against the pathogen in question. With respect to this cholera/TD vaccine Dukoral part of the general immune reaction stimulates the intestine to form IgA antibodies which protect not only against Vibrio cholerae but also against ETEC (a specific E. coli toxin producing bug) and several other diarrhea-causing bacteria. Essentially the vaccine stimulates a type of general first line defense against many bacterial gut pathogens.

There are times though when we do give antibodies either purified from humans or in the past from horses previously exposed to the disease in question. These antibodies will combine with the pathogen in question in order to prevent it from starting disease in the human host. At the same time we also give the vaccine to stimulate the body's own immune system to go to battle with the pathogen but that process to develop specific antibody may take several weeks so direct administration of the antibody in a known exposure buys us time. Usually the use of direct antibodies are for diseases where the outcome, should the disease takes hold, could be tragic. For example, chicken pox in non-immune pregnant woman or for prevention of rabies after a bite from a bat, etc. are examples where we would administer antibody and the vaccine at the same time.

Dukoral is not a panacea against TD and prevention through proper food handling is still the key to staying healthy when traveling.

 

[mstevens]

I've been regularly widely surveying travelers to Coz who have bought/attempted to buy antibiotics since the new law was implemented on 08.25.10.

I needed some antibiotics* so went to the pharmacy at Mega. I asked to write what I wanted since I wanted to be clear, then was told I needed a prescription. The next thing the pharmacist did was ask if I were a doctor (probably based on what I wrote and how I wrote it). I said I was, but he didn't ask for any proof. That's just as well, since I didn't really have any way of proving it while on vacation. He hemmed and hawed a bit then sold me the antibiotics.

*I don't self-prescribe. I phoned my internist back home, who told me to get what I would have given someone else with the same symptoms. Except when doing this is truly not possible, I think it's generally foolish to self-prescribe.

 

[lulubelle]

*I don't self-prescribe. I phoned my internist back home, who told me to get what I would have given someone else with the same symptoms. Except when doing this is truly not possible, I think it's generally foolish to self-prescribe.

I sincerely hope that lay people will follow your example. If you as a physician don't self prescribe, then certainly someone with less training that you should not.

I travel with an arsenal which includes antibiotics like linezolid. I have to, in no small part due to the resistant organisms so prevalent in our environment. I have certain guidelines, given to me by my physician, for what I may treat without calling, and what he wants to hear from me about before I treat if it is possible to call.