My Love Affair with Japanese Encephalitis

About two weeks before my departure date, I visited a travel doctor. I didn’t think I was leaving it too late – I’d had about 47 different vaccinations before I went to South Africa, and after a brief internet peruse, I thought I was covered for Southeast Asia as well. Unfortunately, I was wrong. As I sat across from my travel doctor’s huge desk in Vancouver, she leafed through some pamphlets, then pulled one out.

“Japanese Encephalitis. You should definitely get this vaccination, since you’ll be in rural areas during the time of year that it’s most prevalent.”

“Ok!” I said, smiling. I don’t mind needles, but I do mind weird infections that make your brain swell up.

“The thing is, you need two injections, 28 days apart. You’ll have to get them both done in Vietnam, because they use a different vaccine there.”

Gulp. Suddenly my confidence in my former shots and procrastination regarding my doctor’s visit came back to bite me.

The doctor left the room to try and locate a hospital in Vietnam that could credibly give me the shot. She found one in Ho Chi Minh City, and gave me all the info. I promised I would get it while I was there.

I asked around Project Seahorse to see who’d had the vaccination before their travels. Julia and Kyle, the Masters students a year ahead of me, who travelled to Malaysia and the Philippines respectively, both had. Sarah, one of my supervisors, had also done it. None of them, unfortunately, remembered to tell me I would need it. Sigh… Looked like Vietnamese vaccination was the way to go.

A week into my trip, I blew through Ho Chi Minh City in one night on my way to Phu Quoc Island. No shots. Suddenly I was faced with getting the shot here on my tiny island. That’s when I found this blog post, from a girl who’d been in a very similar position, and got her vaccination at the Phu Quoc Hospital. Buoyed by confidence in a former ally going through the same thing, I readied myself to get the vaccination. I made it abundantly clear to An (my research assistant) what I needed done. A vaccination. Not treatment. This was prevention. Got it?!

So we went to the hospital earlier this week, but I nervously made an excuse that we didn’t have time to get it done. Then we went again on Wednesday – turns out it was a holiday in honour of some really old dead king. So no doctors were working. I really hope if I ever have an emergency that it’s not on some holiday I know nothing about.

Finally, yesterday, we went to the hospital and made our way to the vaccination department. When An explained what I needed, the nurse gave us a completely confused look, and spoke to An rapidly. He explained to me that she’d essentially said, “But it’s a vaccination for children – why does she need it?” I explained that we don’t have the same virus in Canada, hence why I’d never been vaccinated. Shaking her head, she led us into a small room and pulled out the vaccine – luckily the box was in English and plainly said “Japanese Encephalitis Vaccine.” PHEW!

My beautiful new best friend.

I was sent to another room to pay for the vaccine, a whopping 72,000 VND, which equals $3.74 in Canada. Did I mention that each vaccination costs $200 in Canada? Hello money saver! Thanks Vietnamese health care!

I went back to my little room and the nurse quickly injected me (with a sterilized needle, I made sure she pulled it out of new packaging). Then she crossed the room to deliver the exact same vaccine to a one-year-old baby girl, who had no idea what was coming. Judging by her wails as I walked out of the room, I don’t think she was a huge fan of the vaccination. Me, on the other hand – I was smiling that I was one more step towards protection!