The Philippines to host World Health Tourism Congress in 2009
Local health and wellness industry players are expected to secure more clients in the World Health Tourism Congress to be hosted by the Philippines in March 2009.
The global event will be held at the Sofitel Philippine Plaza Manila on March 26 to 28, and will be attended by hundreds of leading health and wellness tourism players from all over the world.
“Our country’s participating health and wellness industry players will have the opportunity to meet the world’s best qualified corporate and institutional buyers in an exclusively business environment where only those who are invited can attend. As such, they will have the undivided attention of their potential customers,” Tourism Secretary Joseph Ace Durano said in a statement.
Hadi Malaeb, managing partner of Aura International Dubai, the event organizer, said thousands of patients from the Middle East now move to Southeast Asia, particularly the Philippines. He noted that about 92,000 medical tourists from the United Arab Emirates alone came to the Philippines last year.
Citing a 2006 study by consultancy firm Globalysis, Malaeb placed the value of the world’s health and wellness tourism industry at $40 billion. “And this is projected to soar to $60 billion in 2012, indicating that health and wellness is the fastest growing segment of the tourism industry,” he said.
The Asian market, according to Malaeb, consists of 1.5 million medical tourists, spending a daily average of $362 compared with the $144 of regular inbound visitors.
Tourism Undersecretary for Sports and Wellness Cynthia Carrion said a number of investors have expressed interest in pouring funds into the Philippine medical tourism industry.
“Every time we go abroad and attend forums on health and wellness tourism, our country gets a lot of interest,” she remarked.
Earlier, Bumrungad International of Thailand, one of the largest providers of medical tourism in the Asia-Pacific region, has bought into Asian Medical Center in Muntinlupa City. California’s Lombard Investments Inc. also bought into Medical City, a 500-bed hospital complex that is expanding its facilities by another 250 rooms.
In April this year, a group of German investors visited the Philippines for potential investments in the tourism sector.
“Our journey (to the global stage) has started,” Carrion said.
