Health Tourists

Karen Gatlin

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An industry known as "health tourism" is growing as more health consumers seek less expensive, as well as quality, medical care. An example is the United Arab Emirates which has embarked on a plan of offering health care to tourists in expectation that it can reap $50 billion dollars a year for offering an alternative to health care to foreign visitors. Dubai has developed "Healthcare City", which attracts tourists for quality health care services. India is also offering medical procedures such as cardiac bypass surgery which is performed in hotel like settings by physicians trained in U.S. hospitals. The attraction for tourists is that the procedures are performed at much less cost than in their home countries. Perhaps such competition will help spur changes in the United States so that more people can obtain quality care without resorting to "health tourism".