Impact of Medical Tourism on Healthcare
Added on 2020-03-16
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Running head: HEALTH ECONOMICS 1Health economicsNameInstitutionDate
HEALTH ECONOMICS 2Medical Tourism Medical tourism is the travel of people in seek of medical care which is, unaffordable,prohibited or unavailable in the country of residence. It happens due to different bioethicalconsiderations for certain medical technologies, unequal accessibility and unhealthy costs.Medical tourism has significantly been promoted in both private and government hospitals indestinations countries that find it as a crucial segment (1). Many countries have actively soughtto develop medical tourism but the concern exists on the implications on the destinationcountries specifically to healthcare systems. Medical tourism raises a lot of challenges for healthsystems when it comes to regulation and finance and currently, it is driven by the interests of thebusinesses which are out of reach of the policy competency. Medical tourism has potentialthreats to health care services and health care delivery in the concern countries and it should notbe ignored. For instance, it brings great inequity in the healthcare systems. The essay willaddress the impact of medical tourism on health care stems and health care delivery. First and for most, there are various destinations for medical tourism in the world. Theseare India, Thailand, South Africa and Malaysia. India is well known for advanced medicine suchas heart surgery, cancer therapy, and hip and knee replacement. Thailand is known for equippedfacilities such as cosmetic and orthopaedic treatment, organ transplants, cardiac and dentalsurgeries (2). South Africa medical tourism arise due to cheap medical tourisms whichconcentrate on cosmetic surgery. Medical tourism has led to increased shortages of skilled professionals. One of thecrucial reason for meagre service provision in health care system is the scarcity of qualified andskilled healthcare staffs. There is also worrying accessibility of medical staff in local community
HEALTH ECONOMICS 3health centres in comparisons with the posts ratified. According to a recent report released inIndia, the country is short of 600000 doctors, 200000 dental surgeons and one million nurses. Inaddition, 75 percent of all medical staff in India are recruited by the private sector and it suggeststhat private sector is a key leading employer of health staffs (3). The increased growth in theprivate sector due to increase in the medical tourism has led to internal brain drain. There is aflow of quality health care specialists from the sector of public health care to the commercialsector.Medical tourism has aggravated the issues on accreditation of quality care in Thailand. Ithas brought lots of concerns on the quality of the healthcare particularly in the target countriesand it has been on the opinions of opponents of medical tourism (4). The private sector ofThailand in collaboration with government has brought lots of initiative to counter the situation.The government has then taken lead in the accreditation process for the private sector. However, in India, medical tourism has resulted in an unregulated evolution of theprivate sector. It is the role of the government in regulating the private sector but it is evenevident that there have been very minimal state interventions. There has not been a clear policystructure to have harmonized set of laws for the private sector (5). The existing policies have notbeen updated and they have been weak and their relevance has been lost completely.Furthermore, it is evident that there are no constituted mechanisms in the government to tackletheir particular issue. Some constituents of the private sector have resisted accepting theapplicability of some laws of their professions. Furthermore, in Malaysia, there is considerate subsidies received by the private sector inform of reduced medical equipment duties and land. The increase in growth of medical tourism
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