Too many infections at the beginning

[Jan2607]

I think, the amount of infections at the beginning of the game is way too high.
In my current colony, a wanderer joined my colony in the first days. When he joined, he came with untreated asthma and the first thing I had to do, was to give him medicine.
A few days later, 2 of my colonists got the plague. One of the plague guys got a mechanite infection on the next day. Meanwhile, I got 4 prisoners, which I needed to treat because of their wounds. 2 of my colonists got shot and needed treatment, too.
Now I have a lack of medicine. I planted herbal medicine in a 7x10 field, but it was not enough. I had only one trader, who sold me 2 medicine (yes, I had other traders, too, but they didn't sell medicine).

18 days have passed now, and if I don't get any trader with tons of medicine within the next 2 days, I will get in a lot of trouble - and I'm just playing on Cassandra Classic medium difficult. I think the occurance of infections is too high for this difficulty level, especially on the first days.

[Aarkreinsil]

I immediately set all of my colonists to not get any medicine. Even for injuries, there will be no medicine. For asthma treatments and the like? Hell naw.

Only when they get an infection or the plague will I allow them to get medicine, and force them to stay in bed all the time for the 10% immunity buff.
A little hint, though, you can permanently cure asthma by ripping the lungs out of one of your prisoners and transplanting them to the asthmatic dude.

[Kluge]

Biome determines rate of infection events. They're more common warm, wet areas, less common in dry environments (whether hot or cold).

I don't really bother with medicine until I'm ready to start swapping out bunches of organs... Just keeping people in bed with a good doctor on-hand (incl. a night-shift doctor) seems to be enough for plagues and infections and whatnot.

[johnnyroberts]

Thus is Rimworld. Sometimes you simply cannot save everyone, prioritize your high medical colonists to focus only on Doctoring the sick/hurt, focus on healing those with high medical skills so they can pitch in sooner. Keep hospital rooms clean and try to replace the floors with sterile/metal flooring.Always plant herbal medicine early on, it helps. You have 4 prisoners? That means time,money,food, and possibly more chaos erupting within your already under staffed colony, consider patching them up and releasing them, more will come. Or go the darker route and fill your fridge with tasty "meats".

[Robovski]

An important factor in avoiding infections is keeping the treatment room clean. Odddly enough when the room is covered in blood/dirt/puke/god knows what you are more likely to get an infection. It also helps if they get treatment asap  and they actually rest in bed after treatment so they have less opportunity to get infections.

[mumblemumble]

Definitely keep doctors in safer fighting positions, injured doctors are very bad

[Shurp]

Healroot.  Healroot.  More healroot.  You do not need medkits for anything except amputations.  A skill 5 doctor can treat any colonist with an injury or a disease just fine.  He can even save seriously shot up pirates that you want to convert to your cult or sell to slavers.