Heal in India: Here is a strategy to utilize India's next major export opportunity

Copyright © HT Digital Streams Limit all rights reserved. Let us change India into a global tourism center center for medical value: Here is the strategy we need to adopt, India has an opportunity to dominate the outcome -driven advanced care against global value. (Pixabay) Summary as manufacturing and losing export steam, we must promote medical value tourism. India’s healthcare sector has what is needed. What is needed is a strategic policy mix that can help it to transform it into a large foreign exchange earner, large-scale employer and leading projector of India’s soft power. With the production of exports reformed by rates and AI automation, India needs a new growth car. One event lies in Medical Value Tourism (MVT) proposed patients traveling to India for world-class care that combines advanced medicine, competitive prices and reliable outcomes. MVT can become a great earner of foreign exchange, a job creator and a powerful vehicle of soft power. The global medical tourism industry is already worth $ 40 billion annually and is expected to be $ 100 billion by 2030. With global health care services of more than $ 6 billion, the main space for growth is enormous – especially as population groups in developed countries impede their healthcare systems. India’s share today is 6-8%, well behind Thailand’s 25%and Turkey’s 10-15%can realistically rise to 25-30%, given our large pool of competent doctors and nurses, strong tertiary care infrastructure and deep experience with complicated conditions. International patients also manage a local services economy of translators, medical facilitators, hotels, transport, pharmacies and rehabilitation. Few sectors combine foreign exchange earnings, employment and national brand projection such as Mvt. What does India better than its peers: Thailand and Turkey, the current poster countries of medical tourism, have built their brands through hospitality, efficiency and focused niches. Thailand thrives on ‘Well-Plus-Elective’ procedures-cosmetic surgery, dental work, spa-based recovery. Turkey dominates her transplants and cosmetic procedures, backed by aggressive marketing and government facilitation. India’s advantage lies higher in the value chain in complex procedures – heart surgery, oncology, organ transplants, neurosurgery, advanced orthopedics and robotic interventions. India also stands up for its large pool of English-speaking doctors who are trained in world protocols, hospitals with global accreditations and long experience in managing cases of multi-morbidity. Add robust diagnostics, affordable generics, reliable nursing, rehabilitation services and a digital health pile to take care of care to the hospital, and India provides a comprehensive ecosystem for difficult to fit. India’s value proposition: For complicated care, India delivers OECD level outcomes at a fraction of the cost and with much shorter waiting times. A coronary bypass that costs $ 140,000 in the US, or $ 15,000-20,000 in Thailand, is available in India at $ 5,000-6,000. These savings extend about diagnostics, ICU care, medicine and follow-up. Lessons of peers: Thailand has perfected the experience layer-so-like recovery, concierge workflow, frictionless arrivals. Turkey shows the power of focus – select a few flagship offers and scale quickly. India must resist the temptation to be all patients. It should anchor its brand on ‘advanced, outcomes-led complex care at Global Value’-and then hospitality and excellence of recovery as added low use. A six-point agenda will help: Brand India as a high-end clinical destination: launch a ‘Heal in India’ campaign focused on outcomes, success stories and testimonies of patients-not low costs. Set up a multilingual portal containing accredited hospitals and offers transparent prices with Concierge service support. Comfortable border border payments: For many African patients, currency transfers are a friction point. India should allow smoother flow through Pan-African payment systems, Rupee Vostrro accounts and UPI gangs with African banks possible. Pre-funded patient wallets can reduce the exchange rate anxiety. Ensure that the insurance transferability across the boundaries: Self -pay services limit the potential of MVT. India must negotiate with insurers in Africa, the Gulf and Central Asia to have Indian hospitals in their networks to have accredited Indian hospitals. A cross-border third-party administrator Hub and reinsurance with sovereign supported will increase the system’s credibility. Reward hospitals that attract foreign patients: Treat MVT as a service export. Offer tax credits or grants linked to verified Forex earnings, with bonuses linked to infection control and patient-reported outcomes. Provide low cost capital for ICU and robotic suites that target international patients. Provides visas on arrival and comfort logistics: introduces a 48-hour medical e-visa with matching visas, creates green airport channels and regulates patient facilitators. Standardize discharge summaries and digital medical records to integrate them with homeland systems. Develop Medical Groups: Build Hubs in Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Kochi as ‘Medical Export Districts’, and provide plug-and-play clearance, recovery hotels and dedicated logistics support. Welfare and Ayurveda can complement it. With focused performance, India can double foreign inflow of patients within 3-5 years, especially for high value procedures. The profits would ripple about the economy. We have the opportunity to dominate outcomes -driven advanced care against global value. If money, insurance and logistics can move as smoothly as the scalpel, tourism in the medical value can be India’s next good services – and a quiet triumph of soft power. The author is founder and chairman, Apollo hospitals. Catch all the business news, market news, news reports and latest news updates on Live Mint. Download the Mint News app to get daily market updates. More Topics #Healthcare #apollo Hospital #Medical Tourism Read next story