HUNGARY plans healthcare city
publication date: Apr 7, 2009
Hungary is putting aside 100 hectares of land near Budapest’s international airport for a health complex, similar to Dubai’s healthcare city, according to Balázs Stumpf-Biró, executive director of the European Medical Tourism Alliance (EuMTA).
A Hungarian, Balázs Stumpf-Biró is the first to admit that Hungary has struggled to understand the potential of the industry. He says: “I was recently with a Hungarian statistician who estimates that 350,000 people visited Hungary last year for healthcare tourism, spending a total of HUF85bn (€286m). The politicians asked him whether he meant millions!”
These figures make perfect sense to Healthcare Europa. Our new report - Opportunities in Eastern Europe – Markets & Reform estimates that 300,000 visited Hungary last year – of whom around 80% went for dental treatment.
Stumpf-Biro says that the new development will include everything from research to hospitals and should provide space for 50,000 workers. EuMTA is a new European special interest group set up to represent healthcare tourism operators and service providers.
It may change its name soon. Stumpf-Biro says that the European Hospital & Healthcare Federation is keen to work with his organisation, but doesn’t like the term "healthcare tourism". He says the medical profession finds it demeaning and prefer “healthcare travel”.
Stumpf-Biro also says that the Hungarian government is keen to change a rule which makes it impossible for public sector facilities to take private patients if there is a single public patient on a waiting list.
Our Analysis: Whether this ever gets built is another matter entirely. Hungary is entering a truly horrible recession. It is a typical Hungarian paradox that the country which, apart from Germany (around Munich) and the UK (Harley Street), probably boasts the largest healthcare tourism industry in Europe, has an almost complete lack of private facilities.
Nor is the industry looking healthy right now. We reckon healthcare tourism in Hungary has dropped 30% as westerners cut back. And that could be an underestimate. In Greece, Tzoutzourakis Konstantinos, investor relations manager at Hygeia says that sales of discretionary surgery are down “40-60%”.
