• Wash hands often with soap and water.
• Drink only bottled or boiled water, or carbonated (bubbly) drinks in cans or bottles. Avoid tap water, fountain drinks, and ice cubes. If this is not possible, make water safer by BOTH filtering through an "absolute 1-micron or less" filter AND adding iodine tablets to the filtered water. "Absolute 1-micron filters" are found in camping/outdoor supply stores.
• Eat only thoroughly cooked food or fruits and vegetables you have peeled yourself. Remember: boil it, cook it, peel it, or forget it.
• Take your malaria prevention medication before, during, and after travel, as directed. (See your doctor for a prescription.)

• Pay special attention to mosquito protection between dusk and dawn. This is when the type of mosquito whose bite transmits malaria is active.
• Wear long-sleeved shirts, long pants, and hats.
• Use insect repellents that contain DEET (diethylmethyltoluamide).
• Read and follow the directions and precautions on the product label.
• Apply insect repellent to exposed skin.
• Do not put repellent on wounds or broken skin.
• Do not breathe in, swallow, or get into the eyes (DEET is toxic if swallowed). If using a spray product, apply DEET to your face by spraying your hands and rubbing the product carefully over the face, avoiding eyes and mouth.
• Unless you are staying in air-conditioned or well-screened housing, purchase a bed net impregnated with the insecticide permethrin or deltamethrin. Or, spray the bed net with one of these insecticides if you are unable to find a pretreated bed net.
• DEET may be used on adults, children, and infants older than 2 months of age. Protect infants by using a carrier draped with mosquito netting with an elastic edge for a tight fit.
• Children under 10 years old should not apply insect repellent themselves. Do not apply to young children’s hands or around eyes and mouth.
• For details on how to protect yourself from insects and how to use repellents, see Protection against Mosquitoes and Other Arthropods.
• If you are visiting friends and relatives in your home country in areas where malaria occurs, please read the malaria prevention recommendations for recent immigrants on the CDC malaria site.

• Don’t eat food purchased from street vendors.
• Don’t drink beverages with ice.
• Don’t eat dairy products unless you know they have been pasteurized.
• Don’t share needles with anyone.
• Don’t handle animals (especially monkeys, dogs, and cats), to avoid bites and serious diseases (including rabies and plague). (For more information, please see Animal-Associated Hazards.)
• Don’t swim in fresh water. Salt water is usually safer. (For more information, please see Swimming and Recreational Water Precautions.)

• Long-sleeved shirt, long pants, and a hat to wear while outside whenever possible, to prevent illnesses carried by insects (e.g., malaria, dengue, filariasis, leishmaniasis, and onchocerciasis).
• Insect repellent containing DEET.
• Bed nets impregnated with permethrin. (Can be purchased in camping or military supply stores. Overseas, permethrin or another insecticide, deltamethrin, may be purchased to treat bed nets and clothes.)
• Flying-insect spray or mosquito coils to help clear rooms of mosquitoes. The product should contain a pyrethroid insecticide; these insecticides quickly kill flying insects, including mosquitoes.
• Over-the-counter antidiarrheal medicine to take if you have diarrhea.
• Iodine tablets and water filters to purify water if bottled water is not available. See Do’s above for more details about water filters.
• Sunblock, sunglasses, hat.
• Prescription medications: make sure you have enough to last during your trip, as well as a copy of the prescription(s).

If you have visited a malaria-risk area, continue taking your antimalarial drug for 4 weeks (mefloquine or doxycycline) or seven days (atovaquone/proguanil) after leaving the risk area.

Malaria is always a serious disease and may be a deadly illness. If you become ill with a fever or flu-like illness either while traveling in a malaria-risk area or after you return home (for up to 1 year), you should seek immediate medical attention and should tell your health care provider your travel history.