Thailand leads Singapore in attracting medical tourists: DBS
Researchers say Thai medical tourism grew faster because it is more affordable, and service levels have improved
AS medical tourism recovers post Covid-19, Thailand’s healthcare sector is logging better growth than its Singapore counterpart, said DBS Group Research in a report on Wednesday (Jul 24).
The research house noted that Thailand’s medical tourism grew at a compound annual growth rate of 5.1 per cent from 2019 to 2023, while that in Singapore grew only at 0.4 per cent.
Thailand’s faster growth rate can be attributed to its more affordable healthcare solutions and improvement in its service quality, said analysts Rachel Tan and Sasikarn Udomvej.
Thailand has 62 hospitals that are accredited by Joint Commission International (JCI) – more than in any South-east Asian country, noted the analysts. JCI is the industry standard in global healthcare, and is benchmarked against US standards and practice.
Thailand’s healthcare costs have risen in tandem with improvements in its solutions and services, but both Tan and Udomvej are positive that costs there are still lower than in Singapore.
Procedures in Thailand cost 20 to 40 per cent less than in the Republic, the analysts said, citing Medical Tourism Association, BudgetDirect Insurance and other sources.
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They also suggested that Singapore may be losing its shine as the go-to destination for medical treatments, mainly because of its higher cost and the strong Singapore dollar.
Since 2019, Singapore’s consumer price index (CPI) has grown 17 per cent. In that time, the cost of healthcare items rose 11 per cent, and the cost of hospital services, by 16 per cent, they noted.
Comparatively, Thailand’s CPI rose 9 per cent over the same period, while its medical and personal care costs grew 4 per cent.
However, both analysts said that despite being more costly, Singapore still had the edge in offering more-advanced medical care that may not be available elsewhere.
They also said Singapore and Thailand’s healthcare sectors can maintain their competitiveness because they target different markets: Thailand’s medical tourism is buoyed by patients from the Middle East, while Singapore gets most of its foreign patients from Indonesia.
Tan and Udomvej prefer Thailand to Singapore for medical tourism, and their top picks are Bangkok Dusit Medical Services and Bumrungrad Hospital.
But because demand for healthcare is growing among the local pool of patients in both countries – in fact, faster than demand by medical tourists – the analysts are also positive on Bangkok Dusit Medical Services and Singapore’s IHH Healthcare.
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