Air travel is one of the safest ways to get from your home to any destination in the world. Although air crashes make spectacular news, when compared to the huge number of flights every day, your chances of being involved in one are tiny. However, crashing is not the only threat in the skies above. Recent years have seen the outbreak of several airborne diseases, including swine flu, bird flu and SARS. How can you protect yourself from the germs that inhabit the air around your airline seat?
The first thing you can do is stay informed about current health conditions abroad. Since prevention is always the best cure, you can prevent exposure to many illnesses simply by adjusting your travel plans in regard to current threats. In other words, if there is a current Asian pandemic, then don’t insist on flying to Singapore. Be flexible with your flight plans whenever possible.
If you must travel, then outfit your travel kit with some sanitizing wipes and hand sanitizer gel. Once you’re seated in the plane, use a few wipes to clean the plastic surfaces around you, including your tray table, your seat controls and the video panel. Keep your hand gel around and use it anytime you come into contact with surfaces, other passengers or the flight attendants. Don’t worry about offending someone. To be honest, they will probably envy your foresight and may ask if you can spare some wipes.
Considering the level of the threat, you may want to even carry along some surgical masks for protection against bugs in the air you breathe. You may also want to look for travel air purification kits. You may not have realized they exist, but there are travel sized purifying units that can actually make the air you breathe cleaner and healthier.