By these simple procedures you can keep nearly anyone alive for a while – long enough for someone who knows what they are doing to get there.

Pain killers

Soldiers have carried morphine in combat for years. It usually comes with a sort of applicator so you can stick it in easy – your own leg or someone else’s. Morphine takes the edge off and stops screaming but it should never be given to someone with a head injury.

Antibiotics

In warm countries especially, cuts and other wounds get infected easily. What would be a simple matter to take to the medic in camp can be fatal in the field. If you don’t have a specialized medic with your team carry a course of Broad Spectrum Antibiotic (BSA) pills, carry a syringe and the liquid form too if you can get it.

Antibiotics work by killing the ‘bugs’ that make the infection. I have found that the best way to take antibiotics is to inject a good dose into any muscle, so you get a decent level in the body straight away, and then follow up with a course of pills to maintain the level required to kill the infection and bugs. Find out from wherever you get the BSA how long the course needs to be. It goes without saying that you should never dose yourself, unless emergency medical support is not available.

That is about as much as you need to know to be a bit of help to your mates when the shit is flying. Do it right and you will make a friend for life and feel warm all over. This is worth learning properly and practicing so make sure you get yourself, and all your mates, on a good first aid course before you go into combat.

PERSONAL HYGIENE

We have already seen that you can function best as a soldier if you are healthy and relatively happy. By and large you will feel better if you can keep yourself clean and healthy. Certainly you will be more popular. Sometimes you can’t and then you just have to put up with it.

Generally, when it is cold you might not wash because you don’t want to take your kit off. When it is hot you don’t wash or shave because there is no water. Being dirty in the cold might not do much harm, other than to your social life, but failing to look after yourself where it is hot can have serious results. Hot climates are where all the bugs and other nasties live. By the nature of things, therefore, most of what follows is more important in a hot climate.

Shaving

If you are working undercover or spending time talking to the locals in an Islamic area you may have to grow a beard. This might be to avoid attracting attention and you may not be taken seriously without it. If you have not grown one before you will find they itch for a while when they are getting started. And they itch a whole lot more when they are full of sweat, dirt and bugs after a few weeks out in the sticks. That is why Western soldiers shave.

In the British Army shaving used to be mandatory for everyone no matter where you were. I remember in training living in muddy slit-trenches on snowy mountains in Wales but we still had to be properly shaved every morning. We were taught how to save a drop of water in the corner of a mess tin then to use the corner of a towel as a flannel to wash and then take a shave with the remains. It probably was good for exercising self-discipline and maybe even helped morale but I think it is a total waste of water and time on active service.

Hair care

Hair is best kept cropped short for coolness and to avoid bugs and rashes. If you leave long hair for a month or so it becomes self-cleaning. I have experienced this myself many times as a young man – when I used to have hair. For the first few weeks your hair gets greasy then it seems to dry and stabilize. Animals don’t get washed in the wild and we didn’t evolve to wash either. This must be natural.

Brushing your teeth

A tooth brush doesn’t weigh much and it takes little water to clean your teeth. Most of us feel better with clean teeth too. I confess I never used to clean my teeth on patrol in certain areas as it was a consideration that trackers could pick up the smell. I suggest that where tracking is not a problem you clean your teeth. At the least this will avoid gum disease which could be unpleasant as well as costing you your teeth.

Keeping your camp clean

Where you don’t have proper latrines try to bury or cover your crap even if you only stop for the night. If you stay for longer it is absolutely vital. Flies are attracted to crap and walk on it. They then use the same feet to walk on your food. This is not only gross but the flies pick up diseases such as cholera from their habits and you can easily catch it. Local water resources can also easily be contaminated by sewage.

It is probably not as well known that hyena steal crap. They creep up at night and eat it if they can. I’m no expert on hyena but one night we were free-wheeling in an armoured truck for some miles down a long hill. We knew the enemy would see and hear the truck intermittently from their observation positions so the idea was that we would jump out without the truck stopping and it would then go on to another base. We could then creep up on the enemy. All of a sudden this 20-ton truck gave a lurch. We pulled in and found we had hit a huge hyena and killed it. Fortunately, as it was like a bear it was so huge! The head was enormous. People don’t realize that hyenas hunt game themselves and will drive lion off a kill. Their jaws are said to be the strongest of all mammals and can crush the thighbone of an ox.

The reason I mention hyena in depth is because a guy I knew was sleeping with his arm out of his bag one night and a hyena was attracted to camp for whatever reason. It crept up and bit off his hand and ran away chewing. The moral of this little titbit is don’t leave your waste lying around. In Africa it would attract hyenas, in other parts of the world it could easily be something which is equally as dangerous.

Sweat rash

Some people are more prone to sweat rash round the crutch than others. I don’t know why. If you get it carry a suitable powder or cream. Left untreated and unwashed it can get nasty – your bollocks will rot and drop off.

When I used to go on long operations – a month in the sticks at a time – I used to wear a camouflaged overall or jump suit. Though eventually they used to go black and greasy, they were loose around the waist and crutch and worn with no underwear this cut down on the exposure to sweaty cloth which nurtures fungus.

INTERESTING DISEASES

You can catch a cold somewhere exotic just as well as in London or New York but when you travel to exotic parts they have exotic diseases and your body’s defences are just not as ready for them as the locals’.

A good example of a clean camp, with washing drying in the midday sun and a cover to keep the dust out of the mortar tube. (Dan Bardsley © UK Crown Copyright, 2009, MOD)

Of course, some diseases are more common in some places than others so make it your business, if your attached medic hasn’t already, to find out what the locals’ favourite diseases are. Your best bet is to just keep an eye on your general wellbeing and don’t be shy about visiting the medic if you have any amusing or unusual symptoms. Worldwide, the most popular illnesses, and by far the biggest killers, are malaria, HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis.

Malaria

You get malaria from mosquito bites and cannot avoid these on operations so take the pills provided by your medic. Catch malaria and you will regret it as it starts like flu and gets worse with jaundice, diarrhoea and vomiting. There are several types and some will kill you despite medical intervention.

AIDS

Soldiers get AIDS from whores. When I was a boy you couldn’t catch anything a jab in the arse wouldn’t get rid of but now you can catch your death. Keep it in your pants if you can, otherwise if you insist on being stupid wear a condom. And never kiss a whore. This is your dad talking.