Quezi

by SarahMcD - CC-BY

The high cost of medical procedures in the United States creates opportunities for developing countries to carry out these procedures for medical tourists.

Philippines senator Richard Gordon believes that his country is well-placed to get a share of a potential $30 to $79 billion dollars spent by 15.75 million Americans who seek medical care in other countries, according to a report by GMANews.TV.

The Philippines currently has a surplus of licensed nurses due to a reduction in hiring of foreign nurses by the UK and the US since 2006.

The Deloitte Center for Health Solutions is reported by The Economist as forecasting that by 2015, between ten and twenty million Americans will travel abroad for treatment each year. It was 750,000 in 2007. This exodus could earn $21 billion a year for developing countries by 2012.

Deloitte points out that this medical travel will correspond to a $162 billion reduction in health care spending within the US by 2012, and that American health-care administrators are “starting to feel the heat”. European hospitals will be subject to similar pressure.

Around 50,000 British medical tourists sought health care during 2006 in countries such as Turkey, India and Hungary, spending millions of pounds. In some cases, the NHS will fund overseas medical tourism if a procedure cannot be provided within the UK.

According to The New Nation, the medical tourism industry is expected to bring over US$4.4 billion to Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and India by 2012. It’s currently worth about half a billion dollars. The article points out that the average traveller spends $144 per day, but the average medical tourist spends $362 a day.

The top destinations for medical tourism, as judged by NuWire Investor, are:

1. Panama
2. Brazil
3. Malaysia
4. Costa Rica
5. India

Wikipedia reports the following medical tourism statistics:

• Israel – $40 million revenues
• Jordan – 250,000 international patients
• Cuba – 20,000 health tourists
• India – $2 billion a year by 2012
• Philippines – 8% medical tourism growth in 2007 alone
• Thailand – 150,000 health tourists and projected earnings of 36.4 million baht in 2006