Is it a coincidence I got sick multiple times after the same flight?
 

Over the past years, twice after travelling from LHR - LAX - ITO (last leg was always UA1004) I ended up getting some sort of 24h stomach bug starting within a day of arrival. Unable to keep food down, slight fever, ...not too pleasant, fortunately it always subsided after a day or so.
At the time I put this down to lack of sleep/germs on the plane/whatever. But it just happened to my sister too (same flight, same symptoms). I have flown a fair amount of long distance flights and never had these symptoms. So I'm wondering if there could be a particular aircraft (UA use 737s for LAX-ITO) that has some kind of contamination in the water or air or something? Does that sound crazy? Would be curious to see what you other frequent flyers think....

You're looking at least 24h of flying traveling west. Gonna say maybe a combination of jet lag and dehydration? I know that coming home to CA from Europe, I start to feel jet lagged by about the 3rd or 4th day back.

This is the definition of a coincidence.

Three people got sick on this route, same symptoms, same recovery time. Yet in all our years of combined traveling we've NEVER experienced it on a different route. Do you really think it's just coincidence?

Was your sister flying with you at the same time? Or was she flying on a different date but just the same routing?

I'd say it's a coincidence. Which doesn't necessarily mean it wasn't the same or similar cause. But if there were a systemic problem with something consistently afoul every single time on a certain route, then you likely would have gotten sick more often. And there probably would have been some publicized incidents with multiple travelers from a flight getting sick.

I wouldn't automatically assume it's the LAX-ITO leg. Symptoms like that can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days to develop, depending on the organism causing it. So it could have been acquired...at home before departure...at LHR...on the LHR-LAX leg...on the last leg...after arrival at ITO. It could be contamination you touched and then contacted your mouth or nose; contaminated food; an unknown food allergy; an airborne culprit.

To narrow down what might be the differentiating factor(s), you would need to carefully list and compare - as much as you can remember - what you did and consumed on the "sick" trips and one or more of the "healthy" trips, and analyze it. Even then you won't be able to pinpoint random incidents (e.g., transferring bacteria from a visually clean but contaminated surface to your body). But you might have some ideas.

Good luck, hope you stay well next trip!

I suspect if there was an outbreak of people getting sick after flying LAX-ITO, this would be bigger news than this thread.

Perhaps it's something to do with your sleep and hydration patterns for that trip? A very long westbound followed by another medium-haul flight isn't something I've personally done a lot of, but it sounds more taxing on the body than most of my itins where the long-haul is usually followed by a hotel room.

If you were traveling somewhere more exotic I might think it was a normal ingredient in the destination's food or water that is disrupting your foreign stomach. But that doesn't seem as likely with LHR, LAX, or the airline catering in those two places.

Most of the time when i fly to my destination flight feels like ages. But when i come back home it dosen’t feel very long. I seriously do not know why. This happens even if the return flight is longer.

That’s *exactly* what this is..... sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

You can’t blame anyone else, you’re not part of a cover up worthy of a news expose. And you’re not going to get compensation for being sick.

You might not like the answer, but it doesn’t change reality....
This is why the word coincidence exists.

Another vote for coincidence.

Next time:

1) Avoid touching your face. That's how most germs infect you, by getting on your hands and then into your mouth/nose/eyes.

2) Wipe down your arm rests and tray tables with a disposable wipe.

3) Hand sanitizer.

4) Drink tons of water.