Got sick at 2am, 6 hours before my flight to America left. The gate to the neighborhood was locked and I didn't know who had the key. Didn't have time to look for it and ended up trying to have the green apple splats as quietly as possible in a dirty storm drain for 2 hours. Almost blacked out from dehydration. Later when my mother in law found the mess I blamed it on the cat.

I almost died from food poisoning from chicken I ate while visiting Shanghai! (ok maybe not, but it felt like it) In hindsight, eating chicken with bloody bones was NOT a good idea!
I was sick for 4 days....I won't go into detail out of courtesy....but I still refused to go to a doctor....I have doctor phobia at home....in China....well....x100...even though I have insurance.

But you are now making me think I need a blood work test!!

I got scabies from either a cheap hotel room or the bus.

I got the same symptoms as you....It ended up that I had to stay one week in a hospital, because according to the Chinese doctors, my kidneys and liver were damaged by unknown reasons.

The fact is that since then.....no more Chinese doctors or hospitals......

I got food poisoning after eating local Nachos with cheese, I puked for a week.
Also I frequently get pain in my lower left abdomen after eating...

I've gotten allergies and a sinus infection which hasn't gone away in over 2 years.

Thanks for replies, sorry to hear about your problems. I know a couple of years ago I ate a duck and man I knew at the time it was a bad idea, and I paid for it for a week, luck would have it I was on a summer break. So now I try to be good with my ingestion!

Alex, dude... you think you got gout from only 1 bad bit of food??? WTF??? That's not how it works! Gout is a build-up of nitrates in the body, that eventually lead to the problem of no longer being dissolve the urate crystals into the blood and washed out through the kidneys. It takes TIME for this problem to occur! (ie, you've actually had it for some time - presuming you actually have it at all!)

It won't be 'bad' food that caused it - it's going to be: too much alcohol, too much meat, or too many other diuretics (black tea or coffee - cos they pull out the H2O that would have dissolved the urate crystals into the blood). And, of course, it's genetic...

Fortunately, for real gout, China has readily available OTC drugs for it - the same they would give you back in the US or AUS... Colchicine. Also, Fenbid is a standard drug here - it's a slow-release Ibuprofen (which is an anti-inflammatory). NB: there are 2 types of Fenbid - make sure you get the one with the picture of the body - not just the head - cos they are different chemicals!

If you really have gout, it will return! And, you'll first notice it in your limbs (mostly behind the big toe).

UNfortunately, if you're in a lot of pain - it will suck here in China. For some reason, the doctors and pharmacists I've spoken to all say that codeine is given for bad throats :( They don't like giving out effective strong painkillers :(

(yes, I have gout. No, my kidney's are relatively healthy... yes, it friggin hurts when it flares up, but I did buy a stack of painkillers when I went home last time !)