What would you have done?

There is a shortage of typhoid vaccine being sent to my local surgery. (They assure me that this is a supply problem, and not rationing.)

Typhoid is endemic in many hot countries. It is water borne, and is a major problem around the rice paddies. Prevention, in theory, should be straightforward - drink only bottled water (easy), clean your teeth in bottled water (easy), make sure all your food is washed and cooked in bottled water (impossible, unless you do all your own cooking. How do you do that, if you're moving from place to place?)

Five doses were delivered in November, and another five in December. Many more of us have travel plans and need them. The advice - keep ringing and make an appointment when the vaccine came in.

I didn't worry in November, I had another month to go. But supplies were delayed in early December. What if none come in, I asked. The travel clinics have some, though you'll have to pay, the pharmacist said. Where is my nearest travel clinic? Chippenham. I have no car, I said - Chippenham is three buses away, buses that are not timed to connect with each other - the trip would take a whole day.

Make an appointment, she said. Then phone in the morning to see if it's in. Which I did - my appointment was at 9.50; I rang at 9.15 - and the five doses were there. She thought it unlikely that all five would have gone in thirty-five minutes. So I raced off, was duly jabbed, and am protected.

Which is fine for me. But as the needle went in, I had a different thought. What about everyone else waiting for a vaccination. What are they to do?

I googled typhoid, as you do.

The Foreign Office recommends: typhoid vaccine only if you are in the Far East for six months or so.

The NHS recommends: typhoid vaccine if you are away for a week.

I don't take health risks - as some of you know, I've done with being ill in unruly places. I'll do anything to make sure I don't do it again. And I'm in a position to race to the surgery when the vaccine is in.

Those five doses will go to those of us who can be organised to race to the surgery when they come in. But who is to say we should have them at the expense of a family of five, off to visit Grandma in the Philippines, who cannot gather in time, nor afford private jabs for all of them? Or the Grandma going home to Mumbai to meet a new grandson?

I can see why the surgery opted for the 'first come, first served' rationing option - how else could they do it? But it doesn't sit easily, knowing that others may be forced to take typhoid risks while I can wander around rice paddies with impunity.

Now for the injections ...

Now I know I can go to Laos (see my previous post about toilets ... or not, if the idea upsets you) I have to brave the injections.

No, they aren't compulsory. Nobody will check if I have them. There will be no surrogate parent will greet me at the airport and scowl, send me to bed without my supper. The only person it matters to is me.

And no, they aren't fun. But who wants typhoid? Or meningitis? Or rabies? Or Japanese encephalitis? (Does anyone know what that is?) Malaria - that's a thorny one. It's patchy - less common in the big cities, or during the dry season. And no one wants to pop pills unnecessarily. (My solution - yours may be different - is to find out when I get there if there is a problem. For instance, on my long trip I knew it was all over the border between Thailand and Cambodia, but I spent just one night there, so smothered myself in DEET, covered every inch of myself in shirts and long trousers, slept under a mosquito net, and managed without a pill. But several days in the backwaters of India - that was too much of a risk, so pills it was.)

Back to this trip. I trotted to the surgery to make an appointment with the nurse. Have I filled in a form? No - please may I have a form, I can fill it in now. No, that is not possible; you must go home and find the form on the website, fill it in, and we will ring you to say if you need an appointment. But I know I need an appointment, my typhoid jab is out of date. I'm sorry, you still need to go home to fill in the form.

Times have changed. Before the long trip I made the first appointment with the practice nurse about four months before I left. She and I poured over maps and Government guidelines and decided which injections I needed, some of which came in three doses - and the result was one injection a week for twelve weeks, to have them all. We got quite friendly in that time. I know she has small children and has always wanted to go to New Zealand. She knows about my magnificent daughters. Send me a postcard, she said before I left. I sent her a postcard from New Zealand.

This time - I have to negotiate with a computer! Where is the fun in that? And she still had to ring me to tell me I need an appointment.

I know change is part of being human. And I don't want to join the bah-humbug brigade that grumbles when we have to do things differently. But, just sometimes, I wonder if we haven't lost something along the way.

And you - are there things that you miss?