This is the Health Tourism News roundup for 20 to 26 August 2026.

India’s medical arrivals fell in 2025

India recorded 507,244 foreign nationals arriving for medical treatment in 2025, about 5.5 per cent of 9.15 million foreign tourist arrivals, on Press Information Bureau figures. Bangladesh supplied 325,127 of them, ahead of Iraq at 30,989, Uzbekistan at 13,699 and Somalia at 11,506.

Bureau of Immigration figures presented by India’s Ministry of Tourism put foreign medical-purpose arrivals at 644,387 in 2024, of which Bangladesh supplied 482,336. The Bangladeshi figure was 499,951 in 2023 and 326,805 in 2022.

On the sending side, the World Health Organization put Bangladesh’s universal health coverage service coverage index at 54 out of 100 in December 2025, with 41.7 per cent of the population, around 70 million people, facing financial hardship from out-of-pocket health spending. A WHO assessment counted 9.9 doctors, nurses and midwives per 10,000 population in 2020, against a global median of 48.6.

Ethiopia costs the outflow

More than 10,000 Ethiopians travel abroad for treatment each year at a cost of up to 700 million US dollars, on figures cited at the opening of a private medical complex in Addis Ababa. The 3 billion birr, 13-storey building holds 110 beds and eight operating theatres, and is the second site in Ethiopia and the third in East Africa with a PET-CT scanner.

Deputy Prime Minister Temesgen Tiruneh opened the 13th East African Healthcare Federation conference in Addis Ababa on 21 August. He put specialised care and local manufacturing forward as a way to stop spending foreign currency on treatment abroad while earning it from regional patients.

The Ethiopian Healthcare Federation has drawn up a 10-year plan whose stated first objective is treatment at home rather than continental leadership. Girma Ababi, its vice president, named facility standards, equipment, professional certification and training as the requirements, with public-private partnerships covering the financing gap. Ethiopia and neighbouring East African states are separately setting joint strategies to localise manufacturing of medical supplies.

Nigeria buys robotic surgery

A faith-based 300-bed hospital in Lagos put 4 million US dollars into robotic surgical services and training, working with a diaspora-founded United States firm. Chief executive Ademola Dada said procedures would be priced at about 5 per cent of comparable treatment in the United States or Europe, and that training would cover biomedical engineers, nurses and anaesthetists rather than surgeons alone.

A public-private centre in Imo State performed its first robotic operation, for prostate cancer, on 21 August.

Iziaq Salako, Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, said the private sector already provides more than half of Nigeria’s health services, and tied robotic surgery to reversing the direction of medical travel. President Bola Tinubu approved a National Cancer Institute at a cost of 302.3 billion naira, to be completed within 36 months, with upgraded cancer centres in Katsina, Benin and Enugu already finished.

Korea sells wholesale

Seoul attracted 1.76 million foreign patients in 2025, 87.2 per cent of Korea’s national total that year, on Ministry of Health and Welfare data. The city holds the eighth edition of its medical tourism travel mart on 8 and 9 September, bringing about 70 overseas buyers to meet 300 domestic sellers.

Last year’s edition drew 358 organisations from Korea and 17 other countries and generated 2,176 business consultations.

Busan held its own buyer event on 26 and 27 August, organised by the Korea Health Industry Development Institute and co-hosted with Daegu, Gwangju and Jeju. Sixteen overseas buyers from 10 countries, including Thailand, China, the United States and Mongolia, met 41 Busan medical institutions and patient recruitment agencies.

Four governments moved on the edge of the trade

Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade published new travel guidance warning that standard insurance usually excludes elective procedures abroad and their complications. Research it conducted with the Insurance Council of Australia found 46 per cent of Australian international travellers had undergone or would consider a procedure overseas, from a June 2025 survey of 1,001 people who had travelled in the previous 12 months.

The United States State Department said nearly 900 visas had been revoked since it established a birth tourism task force earlier in August, up from more than 600 when the task force was announced. Spokesperson Tommy Pigott said the department is targeting networks that present themselves as healthcare services.

Delhi police arrested 17 people and seized counterfeit and diverted anti-cancer medicines worth 90 million rupees, about 688,000 pounds, in raids across Delhi and Navi Mumbai. Investigators said vials were refilled with sterilised water and sold under fake batch numbers.

The United States Embassy in Peru advised American citizens not to take ayahuasca or kambo at all, after three deaths at psychedelic retreats in Costa Rica, Mexico and Peru within fourteen months. A New York Times investigation published this week found retreats that did not screen for cardiac conditions and staff who encouraged patients to stop psychiatric medication.

Dental is the volume and the least covered

Only 33 per cent of Australian travellers knew a procedure abroad might require extra insurance, and among those chiefly motivated by cheaper treatment that fell to 10 per cent, in the same research. Price was the main draw for 69 per cent of those considering any procedure and 80 per cent of those considering dental work.

Costa Rica certified five dental clinic groups for international patients this month, requiring documented experience with foreign patients, bilingual licensed specialists and treatment guarantees. Central Bank figures cited by the Costa Rican Health Chamber put medical tourism at about 13 per cent of international arrivals, roughly 70,000 patients a year generating around 465 million US dollars, with dental work accounting for 42 per cent of demand.

A report published in June by the CareQuest Institute for Oral Health found that about 4 per cent of American adults, close to 9.6 million people, had travelled outside the United States for dental treatment, and that roughly 69 million American adults carry no dental insurance. A comparison across seven industrialised countries put the average cost of a root canal at 838 US dollars in the United States, against 542 in Canada and 436 in France.

By the Numbers

507,244 foreign nationals arrived in India for medical treatment in 2025, against 644,387 in 2024, on Press Information Bureau and Bureau of Immigration figures.

95.6 per cent, the year-on-year rise in foreign patients treated at Guangdong’s 25 designated pilot hospitals since the province opened its international medical pilot in February 2026, on provincial health authority figures.

1.76 million foreign patients treated in Seoul in 2025, 87.2 per cent of Korea’s national total, on Ministry of Health and Welfare figures.

9.6 million American adults, about 4 per cent of the adult population, have travelled abroad for dental treatment, in a June 2026 report by the CareQuest Institute for Oral Health.

66 per cent of second-quarter 2026 revenue came from non-Thai patients at a Bangkok-listed hospital operator, in results published on 20 August 2026.

23 per cent, the rise in revenue from Chinese healthcare travellers to Malaysia in the first quarter of 2026, with traveller volume up 17 per cent, on Malaysia Healthcare Travel Council figures.

What to Watch

Seoul’s medical tourism travel mart runs on 8 and 9 September, with registration for domestic sellers closing on 3 September.

Nigeria’s National Cancer Institute is contracted for completion within 36 months of the Federal Executive Council approval granted in August 2026.

Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Health is required to prepare a health tourism strategy and action plan under the tourism state programme for 2026-2030, approved by presidential order on 20 August 2026.

Iran’s tourism minister has asked for a measurable roadmap to lift Iran-Iraq tourist exchanges to five million in each direction, against about 3.6 million Iraqis and 3.5 million Iranians now crossing each way.