Major impact of Covid-19 on health tourism

The Impact of Covid-19 on the Medical tourism industry COVID 19 is an unexampled pandemic
with a widespread international impact on each industry within the world. The extent of the
economic and social impact this example can have on our future will solely be imagined at this
time.

Discontinuous the health care industry

The pandemic has fully discontinuous the health care industry with tremendous challenges and
pressure on the health care ecosystem in each country within the world. Providers, medical
professionals and pharmaceutical manufacturers are scrambling to produce care to the
increasing flow of patients infected with coronavirus. Their scarce resources are burdened and
are depleting quickly.

Dramatic roadblock

In these tough times, one in all the industries that has faced a dramatic roadblock is that the
international medical tourism industry. The ban in race travel including the over-exhausted
health care infrastructure of countries providing medical tourism has stalled this industry fully.

Global lockdown

Medical tourism may be a lifeline for patients from poor and underdeveloped regions of the
world that lack a health care infrastructure in their own countries. This global lockdown has
caused thousands of patients situated in these countries to be unable to receive the critical care
and medical facilitate they need.

Postponed Medical Tourism

Patients in countries like Iraq, Islamic State of Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kenya etc. are waiting to
be able to visit medical tourism destinations like India, Turkey, etc. to receive critical treatment.
While not the power to travel, they're at a loss for what are often done. A large section of the
medical tourism market is driven by the demand for cosmetic and elective surgery. Ergo, as a
results of Covid-19, several visits to receive medical treatment are cancelled and many more
are going to be cancelled, or postponed till 2021.
Impose Restrictions

The novel Covid-19 compelled governments to impose restrictions on citizens’ behavior,

requiring locals and traveller alike to wear facemasks in public, to observe physical distancing,
establishing curfews, and even imposing lockdowns on citizens and guests alike.

Telemedicine

Fortunately, medical tourism companies are developing with innovative ways and techniques to
increase as much care as possible to their patients situated in remote locations. One such
initiative that is quickly gaining ground is Telemedicine.

Technical challenges

Telemedicine has gained prominence as a lifeline for patients that can't travel and want urgent
medical advice from doctors. even supposing there are sure regulatory and technical challenges
related to telemedicine like the lack of an acceptable telemedicine infrastructure and regulative
restrictions on providing medical opinions on the online, the technology is proving to be a boon
for these patients World Health Organization have no possibility however to attend for this
pandemic to finish. The pandemic has educated the medical tourism industry to be ready for
the worst. In response, medical tourism companies are developing the technology to organize
themselves and their patients for any kind of crisis. The changes that ensue can be the
consolation to the present entire unfortunate scenario.

Loss job and seeking government help

In addition, Covid-19 has resulted in temporary and permanent loss of employment and
concomitant earnings, adding stress on assets, savings, and consumption, as a consequence
forcing households and businesses alike to resort to seeking government help.

Income reallocated
The pandemic has had a sudden, drastic, and dramatic impact on medical tourism. Income
allocated to healthcare treatments and travel has had to be suddenly be reallocated to more
urgent desires, even survival. Medical tourism travel plans regular for the first six months of
2020 were cancelled, or are postponed indefinitely .

Economic impact

The strategies paid off for these countries, as air traffic into these countries for medical travel
continuing to soar, with the market increasing from concerning AED 8 billion ($2.2 billion) in
2014 to more than AED 12 billion ($3.3 billion) in 2018 within the United Arab Emirates. India’s
health travel market additionally exploded by 18, reaching $9 billion by the end of 2019.

But the coronavirus pandemic hit the brakes on the industry’s growth. With a record decline in
airline demand, closure and shut down of medical tourism agencies and widespread financial
hardships that have destroyed several industry key players, medical tourism came to a
screeching halt.

During the pandemic, the majority international flights were canceled. Though there has been a
slow recovery in air flight demand since coronavirus restrictions were step by step raised,
demand still remains abominably low. Throughout the week of June 1, 2020, the amount of
regular flights within the America had dropped 65.1 % compared to the demand at intervals
constant week of June 2019. Similarly, Chinese traveler travel dropped by nearly 87 million
passengers. According to the International transport Association (IATA), air traffic revenue loss
has reached $314 billion globally.

This economic contraction resulted in severe financial setbacks for several airline operators,
some of that were forced to cut down jobs or shut down operations. In May, Air France KLM
announced that it might retire all its airliner A380, airliner A340, and Boeing 747-400 fleets
which it might lower its flight capacity by 70-90%. China Airlines, the national carrier of the
Republic of China, also proclaimed plans to retire its entire Boeing 747-400 fleets while not
plans to interchange them. Some specialists have argued that the airline industry will be
ravaged for years to return.