Would you to travel abroad (to India) with a 5mo infant?
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Anonymous
| Do you have a baby right now? You may feel differently about serious health and safety issues once you become a Mom. It's seriously scary to think about losing a child. Where and what time of the year will this be? Monsoon season is dangerous mostly due to contaminated water and malaria so even if you are home you and you baby could get ill. If you are nursing you can't take anti- malarials so that puts you at risk too. At a minimum your child needs MMR and polio vaccines two months in advance of leaving. Our DC at 9 months had horrible jet lag which made the trip a nightmare. He woke up to play at 3 am for a week! I would wait until your child is older and either pay for family to visit you or get them a web cam and Skype. At 5 months a baby doesn't even sit up yet, will be teething and wont bond well with strangers. For all of those reasons it's a bad idea. |
Anonymous
| I cant even believe some of the responses. Do you know how many babies are in India and survive just fine? And even Belize! Esp. those of the wealthy with access to fabulous medical care? |
Anonymous
| Mosquito nets and DEET. Wouldn't trust the all natural stuff when bugs pose a real health risk. |
Anonymous
Google India and infant mortality. 50 per 1000 births. That's 5 out of 100 die every year. Of course that doesn't count babies lost "before birth" aka stillborn. For comparison that is 10 times as many babies as in the US. |
Anonymous
DEET (a pesticide) on a BABY??? |
Anonymous
| I agree with a PP and would ask your pediatrician. It depends on so many things...if your baby is a good traveler, if you are a good traveler, the immunizations, etc. I took our 9 month old to India and he was fine, but that doesn't mean yours will be. |
Anonymous
Umm...the infant mortality rate in India isn't due to a baby drinking contaminated water. Bringing this up as a concern is like comparing apples and elephants. OP--I agree--ask your doctor. I know many people who were born in India--their mothers went back home to give birth to them vs do so here in the U.S. without help. They all managed to survive. I have been on many transatlantic flights with Indian women and their children who are taking them home for a long visit to family, so clearly you arent the only person in the world who would do this. |
Anonymous
Absolutely. You can use DEET on babies over the age of 2 months. I know we go all nuts over making sure nothing chemical touches our babies, and that's great when we are living in the DC metro area (other than the lyme disease risk, but that's another thread). But if you travel elsewhere where insect-born diseases can be very harmful or even fatal, putting DEET on a baby is the right thing to do. It's been studied for years and it's very low-risk. It's more of a risk of being a skin irritant. However, it's extremely effective at keeping mosquitos away. Unlike almost all of the natural repellents, which work for 15 minutes, at best. |
Anonymous
| 5 month old, yes, sure. 2 year old--NO WAY. |
Anonymous
You're an ignoramus. Do you ever use your passport? |
Anonymous
Yeah, I have to agree with this one! Ours is 20 months now, and I'm thinking we won't go again until he's 4. |
Anonymous
|
We took our 8 and 11 year old daughters to India a couple of years ago. Beforehand, we visited the State Dept of Health's Travel Dept. (in Idaho) and they did an excellent job of informing us of the immunizations we should receive, plus other health related info about India. I was very impressed. If Idaho has something like this, I would think they would have the same services in the DC area. We were very overprotective and even got Rabies shots for the girls because we were going on a tour through the countryside and were supposed to visit an animal rehab center...plus heard horror stories about the aggressive monkeys in Delhi.
We adopted our daughters from China at ages 8 months and 14 months and I considered the plane trip a nightmare. You have to understand that I had infants that were fairly traumatized by the transition to a new family, so the situation is really not the same, but they were so ACTIVE. I think 5 months would be much easier. The jet lag is also a huge factor, so take that in consideration. Maybe you'll have family members who can watch your baby while you take a nap (which you'll need if the baby is up all night). And after four years old---a breeze. We've been to China, India, Kenya, Belize, Mexico, and they are excellent travellers. |
Anonymous
| I would go assuming your infant doesn't have any serious medical issues. I went to India regularly as a child, including before age 1. My DH and I took our twins to India a few years ago when they were just over 2 yrs old and neither of them got sick at all. We will be taking them again this year (age 5). I am not saying it's guaranteed that your child won't get sick, but I think people who have not traveled to India regularly, or who do not stay w/ relatives there, can have an alarmist perspective that is not accurate. There is plenty of top-notch medical care in India, esp. in the cities, and if you're staying w/ relatives you will be taken care of. In some ways it will be easier with an infant because you can breastfeed, the kid won't take off running in public, etc. I agree w/ one of the PP who said you should consult a South Asian pediatrician because they will have a non-alarmist perspective, esp if they regularly travel to India with kids. Our pediatrician fit that profile and she wholeheartedly encouraged us to go. She also explained that malaria risk varies greatly depending on the time of year that you go and where you will be staying...so that could impact your decision on malaria meds. As for other vaccinations like typhoid, I am not sure how old the child has to be. |
Anonymous
This. We don't take malaria pills or anything like that when we go to India, but I still wouldn't take my daughter there if there was a risk she could get a weird fever that could have been prevented by a vaccine. Babies that young get really high fevers and you can't really give them a lot of medicine, so you want to make sure that there is access to good quality care during your entire stay just in case. Not to scare you, but one of my cousins had twin daughters. They stayed at a yoga camp or something like that, and the girls came down with some sort of virus. They had a high fever and it resulted in brain damage (they are both disabled now). Sorry I don't know all the details, and this happened 10 years ago, so of course things are very different in India now, but stuff like that (I think they got something that everyone is typically vaccinated against but not at 6 months) is what I would be worried about. Traveling with an infant, while not ideal, won't be bad because they aren't mobile yet at that age. You won't be really feeding solids at that age, so it'll just be formula or breastmilk. If breast feeding doesn't work out, you have to be prepared to make a lot of formula using bottled water while you're there. There are a lot of unknowns at this point. You might want to wait until the baby comes and see how you feel about it in August/September. Don't worry about the baby not having a good relationship with your relatives, honestly a visit would be better when they are more of a toddler because they can actually interact at that age. At five months, babies don't really do much other than smile, and there can be a lot of separation anxiety, so the relatives may not even be able to hold them that much. |
Anonymous
| Pity the rest of the passengers on the plane. A 12 hour flight with a screaming child is all to frequent an experience. PLEASE DON'T |