9 and 17.3%, respectively), hepatitis B (32.9 and 18.6%, respectively), and typhoid fever (33.7 and 20.7%, respectively), three common well-described diseases in travelers Tacrolimus purchase to developing countries (Table 3). Yet a third of respondents (33.0%) perceived rabies to be high risk at their destination. With regard to vaccinations, only half (50.7%) of the respondents thought that vaccines provided sufficient protection

and very few (13.6%) believed that vaccines were safe (Table 4). Some were concerned about vaccine side effects (12.9%) and the cost of vaccines (17.2%). Table 5 outlines the vaccines received by respondents for their recent trip or previously. Apart from immunizations against influenza and tuberculosis, fewer than 10% of people had received any of the vaccines listed. Of those vaccines normally only taken for travel, the highest uptake was for yellow fever vaccine (8.6% of respondents). Few travelers answered they had received immunizations against tetanus, diphtheria, tuberculosis, or polio. Only 7.9% of travelers

carried vaccination records, nearly half of which were International Certificates from the World Health Organization. It has been indicated PI3K Inhibitor Library screening that protection against infectious disease is suboptimal among Japanese travelers. Japanese participants at international gatherings (eg, international aid activities or disaster relief operations) have themselves become aware that members from other industrialized countries

are better protected against infectious disease risks when immunization uptake and use of malaria chemoprophylaxis have been compared. A Nepalese study showed that while 90% of non-Japanese travelers to that country had been vaccinated against both hepatitis A and typhoid fever, only 5% of the Japanese group had been vaccinated against either of the diseases.7 A recently published study by our research group revealed low use of malaria chemoprophylaxis and poor adherence to other malaria prevention measures among Japanese travelers.5 The current Aldol condensation study, modeled on the airport studies, was conducted to especially define the uptake of vaccines among Japanese travelers, and in the event of poor uptake of vaccines, to identify reasons for this. Compared with travelers from Europe and South Africa, very few Japanese travelers sought health information from travel medicine specialists (35.3,1 25,3 and 2.0%, respectively). Few travel clinics exist in Japan and this could be the main reason for such a low proportion of travelers accessing specialist advice. Given the increased numbers of Japanese travelers already taking overseas trips, information on the need for specialist travel health services should be targeted at physicians, hospital and clinic managers and the provision of such facilities should be encouraged.