Health & safety
Health and Safety in Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone's health and safety picture is straightforward once you know the shape of it: the yellow-fever certificate every visitor needs at entry, standard regional health preparation, and Freetown's everyday urban caution.
Updated 2026-08-16
The yellow-fever certificate is checked for everyone
A valid yellow-fever vaccination certificate is mandatory for entry from every country, with no exceptions by origin, and it's checked at the point of entry alongside your passport and visa. Malaria is endemic across the country, so prophylaxis is strongly recommended regardless of where your trip takes you, and bottled water rather than tap water is the sensible default throughout.
Freetown's everyday urban caution
Sierra Leone is generally safe for visitors, and the practical caution needed is standard big-city awareness rather than anything unusual — Freetown and the peninsula beaches are the areas most tourists actually visit, and petty theft in crowded markets and busy areas is the main practical concern rather than anything more serious. Political demonstrations do occur occasionally and are worth avoiding as a matter of course, and independent travel to more remote areas is worth checking your government's current travel advisory for before finalising plans. Medical facilities are basic outside Freetown, and serious issues generally require evacuation, so travel insurance with medical-evacuation cover is genuinely worth carrying rather than treating as optional.