Male rape: Support for victims

water including that for brushing teeth; avoided milk, cheese, yoghurt, and uncooked vegetables; reduced meat and alcohol consumption; peeled all fruits; ate at the more "hygienic" expensive restaurants, where they wiped dishes and cutlery with their own dishcloth.Unsurprisingly, they endured episodes of thirst and hunger, and expense, to comply.One of them developed infectious hepatitis, bacillary dysentery, amoebic dysentery, and repeated episodes of non-specific diarrhoea.The other developed life threatening bacillary dysentery, giardiasis, two episodes of diarrhoea, and loose stools which persisted for 30 months after returning to Britain.A diet free of pathogens can rarely be achieved while travelling, particularly on a low budget trip to a developing country.Travellers need a balanced view of the costs and benefits of advice about the prevention of traveller's diarrhoea.Scientific advice should not rest solely on descrip- tive epidemiological studies and the principles of hygiene derived from the microbiology laboratory.Randomised controlled trials of field interventions are needed to assess efficacy in the main groups of travellers, by destination.