An ironical situation is seen in the country, when it comes to health care. On one hand the Union as well as the various state governments are criticised for their failure to provide basic health care facilities in several parts of rural India, while on the other, the best health care facilities in terms of super specialties, comparable to the best in any hospital in the US or the UK, are available in private as well as public hospitals in the country.
India can now boast of the availability of advance cardiac treatment, including cardiology cosmetic surgery, orthopedics neuro and spine surgery, spinal fusion, decompression and arthroplasty, ophthalmology, kidney transplant, minimally invasive oncology surgery, infertility treatment, assisted reproduction, neuro-surgery and trauma surgery, bone marrow transplant, nuclear medicine, joint replacement surgery and vascular surgery among other medical procedures.
Hospitals run by the Union Health Ministry, the state governments or local self-government organisations in different states are today in a position to give specialised treatment to their patients and also carry out medical procedures with the state-of-the-art equipment. However, such specialised treatments are more easily available in cities like Mumbai or Delhi.
Maharashtra Government’s hospitals like the J J Group of Hospitals and Mumbai’s Municipal hospitals like KEM, Nair and Lokmanya Tilak have departments for most of the super specialties and the patients are in a position to get some of the finest treatments in the world at moderate costs at these hospitals. The J J Hospital has a very good nephrology and neurology departments, while the KEM Hospital is famous for its Cardio-Thoracic department, among other things. The Tata Memorial Cancer Hospital is by far the best hospital for cancer treatment in the country and the cost of the treatment is extremely low here, as compared to hospitals giving similar treatment in private hospitals. Given all these facilities, patients from other states make a beeline to Mumbai for medical treatment.
The Union Government would be setting up six All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS)-like institutions in Bihar (Patna), Chhattisgarh (Raipur), Madhya Pradesh (Bhopal), Orissa (Bhubaneswar), Rajasthan (Jodhpur) and Uttarakhand (Rishikesh) under the first phase of Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY). Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Gulam Nabi Azad informed the Lok Sabha on July 30 that these institutes would be operational by December 2012.
Organ transplant is not as popular in the country as other super specialty treatments, though at one time illegal kidney transplant thrived in the country. The racket was so well established that patients came from abroad for obtaining an illegal kidney.
As in other fields, India has been catching up with the latest medical procedures and medical technology, as a result any medical treatment that is available in developed countries is now available in India, though we are still to procure some of the latest state-of-the-art medical equipment.
The talent of the Indian medical fraternity has been accepted worldwide. Surgical procedures done at some of our hospitals have been relayed live to Washington, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Perth and Rawalpindi where thousands of doctors have watched them.
Patients, from Pakistan and Bangladesh and from other Asian and Middle East have been coming to India for medical treatment for a long time, but there was a spurt in the eighties. Hospitals and nursing homes sprung up like mushrooms during monsoon, in small towns like Miraj and Sangli, where elderly men from the Gulf came for medical treatment, which was coupled with facilities for their nocturnal activities in some cases, giving these members of the medical fraternity a bad name.
Things have changed today, with the entry of the corporate world in medical treatment. There are now all out efforts to get patients from abroad, making it a lucrative business. Also, the mushrooming of super specialty hospitals in the country has put India on the international health map.
While there are advancements in medical treatment in the US and the UK, the waiting period for specialised procedures and treatments is very long, also the cost of treatment is very high as compared to that in India. Medical expenses in India are lower by 30 to 60 per cent than those in the UK and the US. India has some of the finest doctors in the world, this coupled with the low cost of treatment and near zero waiting time, has given rise to what is known as medical or health tourism. Patients from the US and the UK, apart from some other parts of the world prefer to come to India for medical treatment. India still faces a huge competition from Thailand, followed by Singapore and Malaysia, when it comes to medical tourism.
Many Indian hospitals have secured accreditation from the British Standards Institute and Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health care Organisations. The National Health Service of UK has indicated India to be a preferred destination for surgery.
The Government of India too has taken the importance of medical tourism seriously. The Union Tourism department has included medical tourism in its purview. Under its Marketing Development Assistance Scheme, the department provides financial assistance to Medical Tourism Service Providers (MTSP), i.e. representatives of hospitals accredited by the Joint Commission International (JCI) or National Accreditation Board of Hospitals (NABH) and Medical Tourism facilitators (Travel Agents, Tour Operators approved by the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India and engaged in Medical Tourism).
The Ministry has offices at 13 places abroad and has also designed special brochures to promote medical tourism. The publicity material speaks about cardiac surgery, minimally invasive surgery, oncology services, orthopaedics and joint replacement, and holistic health care, provided by about 45 hospitals, which are being promoted as “centres of excellence”.
Apart from medical tourism, the Tourism Ministry also promotes wellness tourism, which includes ayurved, yoga, naturopathy and siddha amongst foreigners. In October last year, the Ministry held road shows in Dubai, Kuwait, Riyadh and Doha to promote medical as well as wellness tourism.
The Ministry of Tourism has requested all the state tourism departments to promote medical tourism through suitable packaging of identified best hospitals and price banding for various treatments.
A new category of ‘Medical Visa’ was introduced by the Ministry of Home Affairs for patients and their attendants coming to India for medical treatment.
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) carried out a study in 2002 in collaboration with international management consultants, McKinsey & Company, which outlined immense potential for medical tourism sector in India. According to the study medical tourism can fetch around US $ 2.3 billion by 2012. Nearly 1.5 individuals are said to have come to India for medical treatment in 2004 and the number is rising by the year. The talent of the Indian medical fraternity has been accepted worldwide. Surgical procedures done at some of our hospitals have been relayed live to Washington, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Perth and Rawalpindi where thousands of doctors have watched them.
According to a report in the Economic Times on April 25, 2010 stated that last year alone nearly five lakh foreigners came to India for medical treatment.
The Investment Development Corporation of India has predicted that the health care sector in India would grow to US $ 79 billion by 2012.
A further growth in health infrastructure can been expected in the coming years as 100 per cent Foreign Direct Investment has been allowed in this sector and hospitals have been accorded the status of infrastructure. The Finance Department has also allowed a higher depreciation on medical equipment.
While medical tourism will fetch good revenue for the hospitals extending such service as well as to the governments, it is to be seen how much benefit the poor in the country get of these super specialty hospitals.

The writer is a senior journalist.

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