A few years ago one frequently heard of patients from the middle east coming to India for quality medical treatment, but of late there seem to be a lot of people from developed countries like the US, UK and Canada coming here.

At first health insurance was thought of as an expense and while that does seem to play a role in driving medical tourism to poorer countries…to my surprise I found out that there are other complex reasons…

Patients in Canada (Canada has a free government run health system, something which India can only dream of) have to wait even for an x-ray or an MRI!! I couldn’t quite believe it because here, even though we are a poorer nation, people can can get an MRI almost instantly, if they can afford it. And for an operation a Canadian might have to wait for about 18 weeks. As its free, everyone has to wait, money or not. However Canada’s dental health system runs on private insurance and patients generally get faster treatment.

The Americans feel their system is better because it runs on private health insurance. But its been exposed to some extent by Michael Moore’s documentary Sicko. The film shows how “middle-class families cannot afford medical care and profit-driven insurance giants go to extraordinary lengths to limit payments.” He has also detailed the number of people without insurance and partial insurance and also deaths due to delays in treatment or lack of treatment.

But this is the system that India is heading for! Private health insurance companies here are struggling to keep their head above water and are being finicky about payments. Seeing America’s plight, I wonder what the future holds for us. Right now industry analysts here are saying that once the system stabilizes and more people join the health schemes (few people can afford private health insurance in India) then the insurance companies will make money and everything will be all right.