Website: http://transnationalhealthcare.leeds.ac.uk/
This
week, world experts on medical tourism are gathering at a landmark event to set
the agenda for research on this growing global industry.
Travelling from around the world for the
Transnational Health Care conference, these experts will discuss findings from
important international studies that present the key players in medical
tourism, what drives tourists abroad, the itineraries tourists take, the places
they go, the medical treatments they seek out, the management and promotion of the
emerging industry, and the impacts of medical tourism on both sending and
receiving countries.
Co-sponsored
by the Cultural Geography Chair Group at Wageningen University (The
Netherlands), the Academy for Tourism at NHTV Breda University of Applied
Social Sciences (The Netherlands), the University of Leeds (UK) and the
Economic and Social Research Council (UK), the conference will explore the links
between medical tourism and the increasing privatization and commercialization
of health in tourists’ home countries and their destinations, the transfer of
responsibility for health from the state to individuals, and the limits to the
‘healthy investments’ people can make to their bodies. What does it mean when home
health systems get circumvented? Does medical tourism only impose challenges
for health systems – such as additional costs and aggravated healthcare
inequities – or can it also create opportunities for (sustainable) development
within and between countries?
For
further information, in the UK, please contact Ruth Holliday (R.Holliday@leeds.ac.uk) and, in the Netherlands, contact Meghann Ormond (meghann.ormond@wur.nl) or Tomas Mainil (mainil.t@nhtv.nl)
