TEHRAN – On Monday, Mahdi Safari, the deputy foreign minister for economic diplomacy, said Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs plans to attract six million medical tourists per year, IRNA reported.Safari made the remarks in a meeting attended by top officials from the tourism and health ministries and a host of other travel insiders, hospital administrators, and tour operators.Attaining this target requires close cooperation between responsible organizations and institutions, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is at the service of tourism development in its various dimensions with all its strength, Safari said.Deputy tourism minister Ali-Asghar Shalbafian said the most important problem in the field of medical tourism was a disagreement between the relevant institutions and the lack of a single trustee for this tourism field.“Now, this disagreement is addressed with the establishment of the health tourism steering council and the approval of the necessary procedures for the duties of each of the relevant institutions, and gradually some other problems in the field of medical tourism will also be resolved,” Shalbafian explained.Mohammad Hossein Niknam, who presides over the Ministry of Health’s Department for International Cooperation, reminded the attendees of the high potential the Islamic Republic enjoys in the field of medical tourism.“Experienced medical staff, low treatment costs compared to other countries, high-quality medical services and well-equipped specialized hospitals are among Iran’s advantages in medical tourism,” Niknam said.Pointing out that currently, more than one million tourists use medical services in the country per annum, he added: “We are negotiating with other countries to develop health tourism protocols so that we can make maximum use of the existing facilities.”Medical tourism is booming worldwide, as about 20 to 24 million people are traveling for medical treatments annually.

Factors such as increased care needs over longer lifespans, rising healthcare costs, and constant pressures on some insurance industries are reasons behind why some opt to travel abroad.Regarding price competitiveness, Iran currently ranks first in the world, but the country has not been very successful in attracting potential travelers as other competitors like Singapore and Turkey.

People from the Persian Gulf littoral states, Iraq and Syria as well as Iranian expatriates residing in Canada and Germany constituted the majority of medical travelers to the Islamic Republic, who received plastic, cosmetics, open-heart, and orthopedic surgeries amongst other treatments over the past couple of years.AFM