Singapore named Asia’s most expensive medical tourism destination: report

It’s the second costliest location worldwide.

Singapore has long positioned itself as a leading destination for medical tourism. But thanks to the country’s high cost structure, Singapore has now become the second-most expensive medical-tourism destination after Brazil worldwide and the most expensive in Asia.

This is based on data compiled by Patients Beyond Borders. According to Maybank Kim Eng, Thailand and Malaysia are catching up with the country when it comes to providing premium hospital services.

“However, improving standards, lower costs and slower currency appreciation in neighbouring countries are increasing threats. Already, US and UK citizens who used to travel to Singapore for cheaper medical services are turning to India, Malaysia and Thailand, according to India-based Renub Research. Frost and Sullivan has higher 2014E-20E spending CAGR forecasts for Malaysia’s (19%) and Thailand’s (18%) medical-tourism industries than for Singapore’s (13%),” noted the report.

Here’s more from Maybank Kim Eng:
With its high cost structure, Singapore has positioned itself in recent years as a superior-quality and infrastructure healthcare provider, focusing on complex procedures such as organ transplants, neurosurgery, hematopoietic stem-cell transplants and cardiovascular surgery.

With its high cost structure, there is very limited room for its hospitals to compete on prices. As such, its private hospitals should continue to target premium, price-inelastic customers. Private hospitals cater to 70% of the foreign patients in Singapore and 20% of the local market, owing to heavy government subsidies for citizens in public hospitals.

Spending by medical tourists in Singapore grew at a 22-year CAGR of 12.6% over 1990-2013. Still, their 2012 spending of SGD1.1b was below their peak spending of SGD1.3b in 2007, suggesting that the industry is not immune to external shocks.

These included the 2008-09 subprime mortgage crisis. Going forward, Frost and Sullivan estimates that medical tourists’ spending in Singapore will grow at 13% pa over 2014E-20E.