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Cholera Cure

If a person becomes infected, the cholera cure involves early treatment with fluid replacement and possibly antibiotics. Without proper treatment, cholera is curable about 50 percent of the time; if treatments for cholera are started in a timely manner and in adequate volumes, a cholera cure is possible in more than 99 percent of cases.
  

An Overview of the Cholera Cure

Preventing infection in the first place is the best cholera cure. If a person does develop cholera, the next best cholera cure is early treatment.
 

Prevention as a Cholera Cure

Because of advanced sanitation and water systems, cholera in not a major threat in the United States; however, as a result of improved transportation, more people from the United States are traveling to parts of Africa, Asia, or Latin America, where epidemic cholera is occurring. For these people, prevention of cholera involves avoiding contaminated food and water.
 
Travelers who follow the usual tourist itineraries and observe food safety recommendations while traveling in countries reporting cholera have virtually no risk. Those who drink untreated water, or eat poorly cooked or raw seafood, in disease-endemic (prevalent) areas have a greater risk.
 
(Click Prevention of Cholera for more information.)
 

Early Treatment as a Cholera Cure

If a person does develop cholera symptoms, it is often possible to cure cholera with early treatment. Treatments for cholera can include:
 
  • Antibiotics (medicine that can kill the bacteria)
  • Fluid replacement.
     
Cholera Treatment: Antibiotics
Although they are not necessary to cure cholera, antibiotics may be used as cholera treatment because they typically shorten the course and diminish the severity of the illness. Medicine for cholera is not as important as rehydration in cholera treatment.
(Cholera Cure Continued: Page 2)
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Written by/reviewed by: Arthur Schoenstadt, MD
Last reviewed by: Arthur Schoenstadt, MD