To push India as a medical destination, govt mulls easier visa norms for patients

The government is focusing on easier visa norms to make India a global destination for healthcare services, Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia said here on Monday.

Addressing a Commerce Ministry-FICCI event on ‘Advantage Healthcare India 2015’ here on Monday, Teaotia said the government was taking steps “in terms of making visas more easy to obtain and much more flexible in terms of the administration.”

The Commerce Secretary also called for the need to focus on quality standards and accreditation of hospitals and laboratories to enhance the confidence of medical tourists.

Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia are currently the market leaders in the global healthcare sector but “India is right up there and it is moving ahead” in terms of performance and market share over the years, she said, adding that the cost of treatment in India was very low compared with Western countries. “In India, you can get allopathy, ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy,” she added.

Tourism Secretary Vinod Zutshi said about 1.27 million medical tourists visit India annually from countries, such the US, the UK, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and China.

On the occasion, the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce & Industry (FICCI), in a 16-point agenda paper, suggested easier fiscal laws and medical visa norms for foreign patients, including visa on arrival, faster immigration and multiple entry.

“Medical visa for India is often a lengthy procedure taking five days to two months depending upon the country of visa application. This long delay encourages patients to consider other countries over India for their treatment,” said the paper, which seeks to capitalise on the opportunities in the Medical Value Travel (MVT) market in India, whose size is expected to increase to $160 billion by 2017 from $79 billion currently.

“The current concerns of the Indian MVT industry are that it attracts only 3 per cent of MVT traffic,” said FICCI, adding that this was mainly due to absence of effective marketing strategies, strict and lengthy visa process for foreign patients, lack of credible information, non-availability of insurance portability, among others.