Yeni Safak – Boasting world-class hospitals and experts in every area of medicine, healthcare tourism in Türkiye registered solid growth in 2014. According to data of the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), the number of visitors that came to the country for medical reasons has reached an all-time high of 414,600, up 55 percent over the preceding year.
Shadowing the qualitative and quantitative improvements in the country’s healthcare system during the last decade, the number of medical tourists visiting Türkiye rose gradually from 140,000 in 2003 to a nearly threefold increase last year. Medical tourists left USD 837 million in treatment expenses in the country.
As part of a plan to introduce tax-free healthcare zones specifically tailored to foreign patients, Türkiye’s Ministry of Health intends to increase the number of medical tourists to 500,000 by 2015 and to 2 million by 2023.