How does Sickness work in Sons of the Forest

With the full release of 1.0, Sons of the Forest added a Sickness system, which means players can, sadly, no longer drink dirty water or eat bad food with no consequences. The whole thing can seem a little confusing in the beginning, but here’s what you need to know to avoid getting sick. 

Hunger and Thirst are two things that must be constantly monitored in Sons of the Forest. If either of these drops too low, you’ll begin to lose Stamina and be left unable to run, something which is very much needed if you’ve any hopes of surviving an encounter with cannibals or mutants. 

Now, Endnight has added another layer into the mix — Sickness. Until now, eating unsafe food or drinking dirty water wouldn’t come with consequences, but now getting sick will reduce your maximum health. I’m sure I don’t need to explain why that’s a bad thing.

How to recover from Sickness in Sons of the Forest

Sickness can be recovered from in a few ways, but the most immediately effective of all is taking Medicine. Taking Medicine will instantly remove sickness, but that doesn’t mean you should forgo being careful. In an emergency, it’s easy to think that you can drink dirty water and then take some Medicine to make the Sickness go away, but this only works as long as you have Medicine. Once you run out, this method isn’t gonna cut it. 

If you’re out of Medicine or want to save it for when you really need it, sleeping will also work wonders if you’ve been struck down by Sickness. Depending on the amount of Sickness you’ve got, you can sometimes completely recover overnight. 

Of course, if you desperately want to go out adventuring, or you’re miles away from home with not even a Tarp to your name, you might just have to tough it out and wait. Sickness does reduce over time, so you’ll recover eventually, but it won’t be a quick process.