Manipur to Cater to Medical Tourism : A Remote Possibility Still

JC Sanasam *

Shija Hospitals and Research Institute, Langol :: Pix - Santosh Shekhar

Plenty of murmurs on the inclination of Manipur to become a centre for Medical Tourism in the near future is there in its thick air, thick because Manipur is under the overloaded burden of problems like insurgency and violence, a total wreck of law and order, poor erratic supply of power, roads and communication in shambles, the ill temper of the populace, maybe caused by the gum culture; the list is long.

These negative elements are sure to stand in the way of tourism in general, not to speak of Medical Tourism. Because a conducive environment including a high degree of civility among the population, adequate paraphernalia and a world standard infrastructure are essential to usher projects like general tourism or Medical Tourism.

Dreams are necessary, to act as catalysts, to come to materialization. However dreams without efforts to bring them to reality are just a waste of time, energy and money. It is easy to give a perfunctory statement but a pragmatic overview in matters of the inadequacy of its paraphernalia and infrastructure certainly dampens the spirits.

Medical Tourism is no more an obscure terminology; it is there for us to see. India, for one, has done it. Now the world has agreed India is the Hub of Medical Tourism. Civility of the population wise India is not one of the bests; anybody, who has seen the world, would say so. So people's conduciveness may not be a big factor for Medical Tourism because we have seen that India, out of all, can do it.

Cost-effective, perhaps, is the catch word with which India has fledged itself into the successful venture of Medical Tourism. You can see people of various nationalities and unfamiliar languages at the big hospitals of India sweeping down for procedures ranging from surgery for an abnormal artery to that for a falcon nose that has to be reconstructed like the one Cleopatra had.

Statistics in 2007 showed 1.5 lakh health tourists came to India for various treatments, the majority coming from the US, Britain, African and South Asian countries. A recent study conducted by the Confederation of Indian Industry and McKinsey predicted that by 2012 the medical tourism sector in India would soar to a whopping 2.3 billion dollars (roughly Rs 11,000 crores).

It would be no surprise to see 440,000 websites popping up in 0.11 seconds in search of a suitable centre in India for the medical tourists. Before the state-of-the-art high-tech procedures emerge in the country, maharajas and business tycoons of India boasted with their expensive bills they had to clear for their treatment at big hospitals of New York and London. Now the Yale Global put it this way, 'In a corporate hospital in India today, once the door is closed you could feel as if you were in a hospital in the US. '

A cost effective comparison explains it all: A heart bypass surgery on an average would cost US $ 100,000 in the US and at a Max Health Care centre in India it can be done at US $ 7000 only. A spine fusion cost of US $ 75,000 would go down to an incredibly low of US $ 6,300 in India, one tenth of the cost in the US.

Rolling out the red carpet are top-of-the-line hospitals of corporate bodies like Fortis Health Care India/Fortis Escorts Hospitals (46 centres spread out in big cities of India), Max Health Care Centres, Get Well Soon - India, Life Care & Hospitality at Hyderabad, to name a few. They cover Medical & Health and Surgical care, Travel, Technology, Marketing, Insurance, Nursing etc.; and they take care of their clients. These catering centres have to be armed with internationally approved accreditation.

The Fortis Health Care-Fortis Escorts Hospitals with their program of International Patients Service Centres see to it that they extend a warm welcome to the visiting Health Tourists at the airport, bringing them to smooth registration and emancipation. The service comprises of transport from the airport to the centre, courteous attendance to every single appointment, harmonization of the admission procedures, prompt cost estimation for the expected treatment, dispensation of second medical reviews, booking at hotels/guest houses, visa help/flight preparation and extensions, offer of language interpreters, attention to food habits/dietary requirements, facilities for religious prayers, local tourism, foreign exchange, scheduled consultation through Telemedicine, identification and recommendation of select hospitals worldwide for follow up.

Some in the range of sophisticated medical facilities offered to international patients are: Vascular and Cardio-thoracic surgeries, Cardiology, Orthopaedic procedures (Total Knee/Hip and other joints Replacements), Cosmetic and Plastic surgery, Bariatric surgery (weight reducing surgery), Gastric Banding, Gastric Bypass, General surgery, Obs & Gynaec care, Head & Neck surgery, Minimal but adequate Invasive surgery, Neurology and Neurosurgery, Nephrology and Renal Science (Renal/Kidney transplantation, Dialysis), Paediatric surgery, Ophthalmological procedures.

All these can be acquired in no time; human resource is very rich in Manipur. It is exposure and adequate training, and subsequent practice that is required all about. Equipments, however costly, can be had if the fund is there. For this, formation of corporate bodies with or without outside participation is a must; one-man-show and single handed efforts is likely to result in vain.

What is worrying is the total lack of paraphernalia and infrastructure. Establishment of such three-four centres will require constant supply of 200 to 300 megawatts of power, about 60,000 tons of hygienic water on their own. Streets, avenues, criss-cross fly-over motorways of world standard, parks and resorts, star rated hotels, quality transport system, parking lots, shopping malls and centres, without all these, health tourists will opt for other cities.

Manipur is still in the sand pit unable to improve more than the existing power supply of a few hundred or so individuals, the so called VIP's. Those who are supposed to look into the matter have no idea of the plight of 'no electricity'; because for them it is there 24X7 hours. The basic first step is yet to be taken in every sphere.

Can anyone cite an example of Manipur's first step towards such a vision?