Medical tourism to India on the up as Covid impact ebbs
With lockdowns and travel restrictions due to Covid-19, condition of some patients had deteriorated
NEW DELHI: Twenty-one endstage kidney, liver and heart patients from Myanmar arrived at New Delhi’s Apollo Hospital on Friday in a chartered flight arranged by the hospital, as medical tourism that was hit by the Covid-19 pandemic started picking up again.
Most of these patients are lined up to undergo organ transplants, and had been waiting for months for travel restrictions due to the pandemic to ease as transplant surgeries are not widely done in their country.
“With initial lockdowns and travel restrictions imposed worldwide due to Covid-19, the condition of these patients had deteriorated to such an extent that a transplant was the only way out. These patients were chronic cases of kidney, liver and cardiovascular diseases and have been waiting for organ transplants for over six months now,” the hospital said in a statement.
“Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals along with the Indian embassy has arranged for a special chartered flight to get these patients to India for immediate kidney/liver transplants and expedite treatment for patients requiring attention for cardiovascular ailments,” it added.
The ministry of external affairs (MEA), government of India, did not officially comment on the arrival of these patients; however, people familiar with developments said on condition of anonymity that special permission was given for airlifting the 21 ill persons on humanitarian grounds.
Medical tourism in India had been steadily growing over the past few years. The government data for 2019 and 2018 showed at least 6% of the overall tourist flow to India was of people arriving for treatment.
Foreign tourist arrivals for medical reasons in 2019 were 697,453 — 6.4% of the total; for 2018, the number was 644,036, 6.1% of the total tourist inflow.
While the ministry of tourism is yet to make public data on international patients who arrived for treatment to India in 2020, most hospitals that had 10-15% of their patient rush from overseas said they did not see the usual rush of international patients last year because of the pandemic.
“The percentage of international patients dropped substantially last year; it is picking up this year but very gradually. The normal rush is still not there. In our hospital we would see about 10-15% foreign patients annually, which is now as low as 2-3%, but patients have started coming in,” said Dr Yatin Mehta, chairman, Institute of Critical Care & Anesthesiology, Medanta hospital.
Also, patients who travel to India for treatment currently are largely those needing critical care. “These are all patients suffering from chronic conditions that can be life-threatening such as organ failure, cancers or brain tumour,” said Dr Sibal.