Politicians and doctors have called for all would-be Kokoda trekkers to undergo compulsory health checks following the third Australian death on the gruelling track this year.
Father of four Paul Bradfield, 38, suffered a suspected heart attack in his sleep early on Sunday morning after starting out on the 96km trek last week.
Mr Bradfield underwent months of training before embarking on the trek with a Townsville-based group raising money for children's cancer charity Camp Quality.
However, a spokesman for Peregrine Adventures, which organised the tour, said Mr Bradfield had not been required to undergo a medical evaluation before setting off for Kokoda.
He said Mr Bradfield, a Woolworths manager from Townsville, was considered "young, fit and healthy" by company representatives.
Trekkers were generally only required to fill out a medical form, he said.
Currently there are no industry guidelines for tour operators using the track, which is visited by more than 6,000 people each year, though work is underway on a Code of Conduct.
Tasmanian Liberal senator Guy Barnett, who walked the track last year, said the code should include mandatory health checks for all trekkers.
"It's very important, more needs to be done to ensure that the risks are reduced," he told AAP.
"(The track) is rigorous, it's gruelling, the conditions are challenging in the extreme and one must be very well prepared," he said.
He said the code should also ensure trekkers are made fully aware of the risks associated with Kokoda.
Australia's peak medical body said that while a medical examination could not guarantee safety on the dangerous trek, it could help minimise the risk of serious health complications.
"There are some conditions that may not necessarily just come out in a simple consultation, but certainly that has to be the starting point," Australian Medical Association (AMA) Queensland president-elect Dr Gino Pecoraro told AAP.
He said it was vital for trekkers to be well prepared for the hike and to understand their own limitations.
"It's believed part of the reason there are deaths is that people may be ill prepared, they may not be drinking enough water, they may not be acclimatised to exercising in extreme heat and humidity," he said.
Mr Bradfield's body is expected to be flown back to Townsville later this week.
A 26-year-old NSW man and a 36-year-old Victorian mother died earlier this year on the Kokoda Track, a single-file 96km foot thoroughfare that follows the path used by diggers in World War II and has become popular with Australian tourists.
An emergency health expert, based in Papua New Guinea, says he has repeatedly called for greater scrutiny of trekkers' health.
Brad Bailey, who runs medical evacuation service Medevac Pacific Services out of Port Moresby, has been involved in medical air rescue since 1989.
He said with 6000 people taking on the track every year, more and more trekkers are ending up injured, sick or dead.
"Health testing has to be more rigorous," he said.
"Doctors just can't go rubber-stamping people for the adventure. It's got to be serious; lives are at risk."
"There is nothing wrong with booking in for a stress test."
Mr Bailey said there had been a sudden rise in exhaustion and dehydration.
"They're not ingesting enough fluids," he said of the trekkers.
"It's a whole culmination of things. Some of them get off the plane, fly into Kokoda and it's like being dumped in a sauna for eight days.
"It used to be knee joints and sprained ankles but now there is food poisoning, amoebic dysentery.
"It's getting worse every year."
Mr Bailey said nothing can prepare Australians for the challenge.
"Training on flat Melbourne or Sydney ground with a 30kg bag is nothing compared to Kokoda's conditions.
"The humidity is running in the 90s, the temperature can get up to 35 degrees in the day and then during the night drop down to 18 degrees."
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