One vet who has lived here for a while is reader Rick Deahl who asked me if I would like to publish some information regarding medical and hospital services available to United States veterans living here in Costa Rica.

I jumped all over that, and this post is the result. If this topic is of interest to you, read on! I am not a vet, so if I screw up some terms, cut me some slack. If you wish to add information, correct me, please use the comments area at the bottom of this post. I have to admit that I was a bit surprised as to the breadth of the data and services available to vets. At the end of this post, look for a list of all web sites I could find that might be of value to vets living or coming to live in Costa Rica. Also, several links in this post require Adobe Reader be installed on your computer. Adobe Reader can be downloaded here.

Extensive medical benefits are available to vets living here.  By this I mean excellent medical care, access to specialists, hospitalization, prescriptions (either free or at a discount), and varying support services.

While it seems that some other hospitals do have some staff familiar with VA affairs, it appears that one hospital in particular is the best contact point and provider of all the services mentioned above.

Hospital Hotel La Católica (+506-2246-3000) also sometimes known as Clinica Católica is located in the San Jose suburb of Guadalupe. The hospital was known as Clínica Católica for twenty six years and was founded by Franciscan nuns.  Years later, the formal name was changed to Hospital Clínica Católica de la Purísima Concepcion Association or just Hospital Hotel La Católica.

Hospital Hotel La Católica actually has an American Legion office on the premises. The director Jim Young is the man in charge and he can be reached at +506-2246-3509.  He certainly would be a good place to start for gathering more detailed information than I can give in this post. His email is: jey08442[at]aol.com.

Incredibly, the infected woman decided to ignore health officials and broke quarantine so she could attend classes at her university.

Thirty-five others are under watch.

A third person, a youngster, has flu symptoms (not yet confirmed as Swine Flu) possible infected by her father who recently returned to Costa Rica from Mexico. If confirmed, that would be the first case of swine flu caught within the borders.

The Ministry of Health this morning asked the passengers of two other flights, TACA LR 631 and Mexicana  387, to call 911 emergency so they may be tested.

Employees at the San Jose airport are wearing surgical masks, and many incoming passengers are having their temperatures taken upon arrival.

I am not going to go into this swine flu deal because unless my readers are living on another planet, you have been deluged with probably more information that you want to know.

I am more concerned though as my wife works at Calderon Guardia Hospital.

While justifiably scary to most parents, the numbers themselves are small  Still, it bears spending some time learning about this parasite.

Basically, the whole process starts with rats. Rats become infected and pass larvae in their feces. Slugs and snails come in contact with the feces and they then become infected. The disease is passed to humans while eating undercooked snails or possibly on vegetables that either have small snails on them or perhaps have not been thoroughly washed. I say perhaps, because the Center for Disease Control (CDC) states “There is some question whether or not larvae can exit the infected mollusks in slime”.  Some here think that just contact with the slime of a slug can infect a person, maybe by just crawling around on a lettuce leaf, but clearly there is no proof of this. More likely would be ingesting a tiny snail in your salad.  Either way, wash those veggies!

I know little about escargot, but I know a ton of folks who dote on it. I tried it once and liked it, but then if you put enough garlic on a shoe, I’d probably like it equally. I also think special snails are used in preparing escargot.  Probably went to prep school or something… but just the same, I think thorough cooking is called for.

Kids, however, can find slugs and snails to be fascinating. They pick them up and think they might make fine pets.  A few weeks ago, however, a little boy (15 months) died after eating a slug. He passed after spending  two week in Childrens Hospital.. The larvae do just terrible things to a child’s intestines.

Interestingly, all of the kids involved lived either in San Jose or Alajuela. I say interestingly as, in general, Cost Rica’s normally nasty critters and bugs live on the coasts or the rain forests where the tropical heat provides a better environment.

This all starts with the rats, of course, so in addition to the cautions above, make sure there is no thriving rat population near you.