Israel has become a favorite destination of medical tourists from the United States and around the world.

The booming industry that attracts foreigners to Israel for medical procedures is chipping away at the nation’s equal access to healthcare, according to an annual State Comptroller’s report issued this month in response to research by Haaretz, a portal devoted to news in the Middle East.

Despite the establishment of a Health Ministry committee to implement government supervision of the growing industry, regulation drafted by the ministry in June 2011 based on recommendations by an expert panel has yet to be formally adopted. Just recently, Haaretz published data received under the Freedom of Information Law that shows that in the absence of government supervision, health tourism at government-owned hospitals grew 220 percent in the two years between 2009 and 2011. According to data presented during the Knesset debate following the research findings, in the first half of 2009 alone more than 23,000 tourists arrived in Israel for medical treatments.

The State Comptroller’s findings are that medical tourism is akin to private healthcare, and, thus, harms the principle of equality. The comptroller’s report warned that as medical tourism grows at privately run hospitals, a likely result will be the poaching of staff from public hospitals.

Medical tourists from the United States, Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe travel to Israel for its state-of-the-art facilities and highly skilled physicians who are trained to handle complex treatments that may not be available in other countries and at a fraction of the cost. Israel is ranked among the top 28 healthcare systems in the world because of its cancer, fertility and IVF treatments and neurosurgery and oncology surgeries.

Despite almost two years since it was first publicized, nothing in the Health Ministry’s draft of the regulation has yet been implemented. The draft states, among other things, that every hospital will give preferential treatment to Israeli residents ahead of medical tourists; medical tourism services will not exceed 5 percent of the medical center’s turnover; profits from medial tourism will be used for developing hospital infrastructure; and that a certain percentage of government hospitals’ profits from medical tourism will be dedicated to the development of hospitals in Israel’s geographic periphery.

“The ministry supervises medical tourism in the hospitals, reviewing operations every year in order to verify that they do not exceed the level recommended by the expert committee,” the Health Ministry stated. “The committee recommendations were formulated in a director-general’s memo, but at a certain stage following a different policy expressed in discussions with the director general of the Prime Minister’s Office and in accordance with the new policy formulated by the ministry with the goal of regulating the area of medical tourism in Israel, it was requested to hold-off [issuing] the memo until a comprehensive policy decision is reached by all relevant authorities. The position of the Health Ministry and the Finance Ministry on this matter is identically and medical tourism will be restricted at hospitals that don’t supply available services to the public health system.”

Taiwan is hoping free trade zones will get its economy back on track.

As the world economy struggles to get back on its feet, the government of Taiwan is working to fill the shoes of industrial transformation and national development with free trade zones. The Council for Economic Planning and Development identified high value-added agricultural processing, cross-border collaboration in strategic sectors, international medical care and smart logistics as avenues for business activity at facilities within the planned zones.

This means medical tourism could get a bump if the government follows through on the tax-free zones, which would foster economic development, investment in healthcare infrastructure and international and international standards of excellence; establish world-class clusters of hospitals, life sciences and medical research and education; and serve patients locally, regionally and internationally.

“In the past half century, Taiwan underwent several rounds of trade liberalization that helped drive the country’s economic growth,” said Kuan Chung-ming, the minister for CEPD, the agency in charge of mapping out and implementing the FEZ initiative. “The project will leverage Taiwan’s advantages in human resources, information and communication technologies, pivotal location in East Asia and special economic ties with mainland China to develop high value-added economic activity.”

The core concepts behind the zones are globalization and trade liberalization, according to Kuan. The initiative will also bring Taiwan closer to global markets and help create conditions necessary for the country’s participation in regional economic integration through such alliances as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership and Trans-Pacific Partnership.

According to the Department of Health, Taiwan is poised to become an international medical tourism center given its leading medical technology, quality service and reasonable prices.

“DOH will focus efforts on implementing regulatory easing and other supporting measures to ratchet sector output up to NT$30 billion (US$1 billion) in five years while boosting other industries such as biomedical devices, insurance and tourism,” a DOH official said.

To attract foreign investment to the region, firms registered outside of Taiwan will be allowed to hold a maximum one-third stake in medical institutions operating in the FEZs. The official stressed that these facilities will be staffed primarily by local health professionals.

“These institutions cannot offer services under the national health insurance plan, but ROC citizens can use the services at their own expense,” the official said.

CEPD has initially designated Taiwan’s five free trade ports ― Keelung, Kaohsiung, Su-ao, Taichung and Taipei ― and Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport as trial sites for the project. Other municipalities can also apply to become FEZs if they meet certain qualifications.

State support including tax incentives and streamlined procedures for immigration and land procurement will be offered to qualified individuals and companies operating in the zones.

The CEPD initiative was green-lighted, April 26, by the Cabinet, which is in the process of organizing a task force headed by Vice Premier Mao Chi-kuo to review implementation of the project.

All related agencies have been directed to prepare concrete action plans for developing the four designated business categories in the next two months. If everything goes as planned, the project will kick off in July.

Turkish moustaches have become all the rage for medical tourists, particularly, men from the Middle East, Europe and Asia.

Turkey’s economy is getting a facelift, a hair-raising experience of sorts that is not only sprouting the growth of whiskers above the upper lip, but profits in the country’s booming medical tourism sector as well. Long favored as a destination for the follicly challenged, Turkey’s cosmetic surgeons have for years offered hair implants to those balding on top. Now, moustache transplants for the face are growing in popularity, cosmetic surgeons and tourism agencies say, as men from the Middle East, Europe and Asia are coming to Istanbul seeking a virile addition for their upper lips.

The procedure uses a technique called follicle-hair extraction, in which doctors remove clusters of hair from the more hirsute areas of the body and implant them along the lip or cheeks to magnify a mustache or beef-up a beard.

Performed under local anesthetic, the surgery takes around five hours and can cost up to $5,000, cosmetic surgeons say. Medical tourism agencies have begun offering “transplant packages” combining facial-hair operations with a shopping vacation in Istanbul or beachside retreat on the Mediterranean coast.

Most customers are foreigners, according to surgeons, as Turkey’s emergence as a place for facial-hair transplants comes as the number of Turks wearing mustaches has declined sharply.

Selahattin Tulunay is one of the surgeons profiting from this bewhiskered boom. From his surgery clinic in an upscale neighborhood known as Istanbul’s Beverly Hills, Dr. Tulunay started facial follicle transplants two years ago and now says he completes up to 60 such operations a month.

“The mustache is making a comeback,” he told the Wall Street Journal as he leafed through a photo album showcasing his most-prized creations. “If a man’s mustache doesn’t grow, he wants to know he can have one as a mark of masculinity. Our customers know that if they pay, we can deliver the results.”

A 34-year-old businessman from Erbil, in northern Iraq, said he traveled to Dr. Tulunay’s clinic after years of low self-esteem over the patchy hair growth on his upper lip.

“The mustache is very important in our culture and my wife supported me to get the operation,” he said. “Now, I feel much better. I’ve recommended it to my friends.”

Facial-hair transplants are at the fringe of a broader medical tourism boom in Turkey, which last year generated $1 billion in revenues. The number of visitors Turkey welcomed specifically for surgical procedures rose to 270,000 last year from 156,000 in 2011, according to data from a 2012 report by Turkey’s Health Ministry.

The report showed 100,000 people traveled to Turkey specifically for plastic surgery in 2012, although the numbers don’t break out figures for facial-hair transplants.

The mustachioed and bearded stars of Turkish soap operas — wildly popular across the Middle East, North Africa and the Balkans — have helped again make facial hair a popular symbol of virility and machismo. Surgeons say many patients request the full-bodied mustache worn by Turkish singer Ibrahim Tatlises, which has long set the standard for top-drawer whiskers. Another popular style is the stubble beard worn by Turkish TV show heartthrob and model Kivanç Tatlitug, surgeons say.

“My patients often bring pictures of the stars they want to look like, but I never do what they say because it wouldn’t suit their face,” said Canan Melike Koksuz, a surgeon at Isom, an Istanbul cosmetic surgery practice, which says it has welcomed chief executives and celebrities from as far away as China and Australia for hair transplants. “Once there was less demand because facial hair was more political, but now mustaches and beards are more fashionable, and people want to look trendy.”

It isn’t only men who are seeking ways to emulate Turkey’s rising stars. Clinics in the Middle East have reported that Arab women, who previously favored the full lips, small noses and protruding cheekbones of Lebanese singers, are now requesting the more natural looks of Turkish soap stars.

“Turkish TV series have introduced the natural look. Women who had nose remodeling operations in the past are now unhappy with the shape; they want their tip-tilted noses to look more natural,” said Zekeriya Kul, a plastic surgeon who says he recently moved from Dubai to his native Turkey to profit from the surgery boom.

According to surgeons and agencies specializing in medical tourism, the vast majority of clients come from the Middle East, where facial hair still bristles with political meaning. To be clean shaven has for decades been a political statement of solidarity with the secular, Westernizing elites who were pre-eminent across much of the Arab world until the series of uprisings that came to be known as the Arab Spring.

Despite Turkey’s emergence as a hub for facial hair transplants, the number of Turkish men wearing mustaches has declined rapidly, according to pollsters. A study by Istanbul’s TNS Market Research Company found that while 77 percent of Turkish men had mustaches in 1993, the figure fell to 34 percent in 2011 and is still sliding.

Academy Award winner Angelia Jolie announced that she has had a double mastectomy.

Even the possibility was enough to provoke actress Angelia Jolie to go to any length to prevent cancer down the road. In an op-ed published in the New York Times, the Academy Award winner announced that she had a double mastectomy after learning she carried a faulty gene linked to a high chance that she would develop both breast and ovarian cancer. Her mother, Marcheline Bertrand, got ovarian cancer in her late ‘40s and died at the age of 56.Bertrand’s mother died at the age of 45. When doctors told Jolie she had an 87 percent chance of getting breast cancer, the 37-year-old made the unenviable choice to have pre-emptive surgery.

Jolie’s announcement sent not only shockwaves, but words of encouragement through any woman with a family history of breast or ovarian cancer. The surgeries to remove her breast were not cheap and could be a concern to any potential candidate without top-level insurance.

Fraction of Cost Overseas

The good news is that medical tourism destinations in Mexico, India, Turkey, Jordan and South Korea have the physical infrastructure and highly trained doctors to surgically perform a mastectomy at 40-80 percent less of what it costs in the United States.

Mastectomy involves the complete or partial removal of either, one or both the breasts. The procedure is commonly used for the management of carcinomas of the breast. It is the second most-common cancer among women in the United States, and also attributes to one percent of cancer-related deaths in males.

The decision to have a mastectomy was not easy, but Jolie says she is happy she made it. She said the chances of her developing breast cancer have dropped from 87 percent to under 5 percent. She can now tell her six children that they don’t need to fear they will lose their mother to breast cancer.

Many patients, for a variety of reasons including low prices, easy accessibility and procedures not yet available in the United States, choose to seek treatment overseas for cancer. Treatments for breast, prostate and thyroid cancers are among the most are the most heavily trafficked to medical tourism destinations.

Stem cell transplant surgery has enabled Hannah Warren, who was born without a trachea, to breathe comfortable and respond to doctors and nurses.

Some might call it a miracle. Others say it’s a trachea made of plastic fibers mixed with stem cells. A two-year-old girl knows only that it is breathing life into her tiny body that only a month earlier was given little hope of survival.Thanks to surgery that connected the transplanted artificial windpipe to her mouth and lungs, doctors say Hannah Warren, who was born without a trachea, is breathing on her own and responding to hospital staff.Warren, a Korean-Canadian, is only the sixth patient in the world to undergo the surgery and first in the United States to receive the transplant pioneered by Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, director of the Advanced Center for Regenerative Medicine at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

Survival Chances Upgraded

Macchiarini performed the nine-hour operation, April 9, at the Children’s Hospital of Illinois, after carefully creating the windpipe using stem cells from Warren’s bone marrow that were saturated over a matrix of plastic fibers shaped into a tube. Children born without a trachea are given a 1 percent chance of survival.

Exactly what happens to the windpipe after the transplant isn’t clear, but researchers believe that placing stem cells, which are capable of developing into different types of body cells, can pick up signals from their environment and integrate with existing tissues.

Macchiarini told the New York Times that the body’s regenerative capabilities may help such bioengineered organs to integrate with existing tissues. Children may make ideal patients for these procedures because they have natural and active abilities to heal and grow.

“Hannah’s transplant has completely changed my thinking about regenerative medicine,” said Macchiarini, who wants to conduct a clinical trial in the United States to properly assess the risks and benefits of the procedure, and document how bodies react to the transplanted devices.

The Food and Drug Administration has approved the transplant as only an experimental procedure. Stem cell treatment is not permitted in most countries, and it is only permitted to some extent in the United States. While research and procedures are somewhat restricted in the United States, scientists from around the globe continue to explore the efficacies of embryonic and adult stem cells with astonishing results.

Demand Increases Abroad

Now, as the public becomes increasingly aware of these treatments, the demand for stem cell therapies has moved more and more patients from the United States and Europe to travel abroad to seek experimental procedures.

About one in 50,000 children worldwide are born with a windpipe defect or without one. For these patients and others with defective or diseased organs, manipulating stem cells to generate healthy tissues or organs could be their only chance at survival.

Macchiarini performed all five of the previous transplants of the bioengineered windpipes; four of the patients have done well, while another who received his trachea in Stockholm died. Because of the small number of patients he has treated, critics say it’s hard to determine how valid Macchiarini’s bioengineering technique is in treating patients like Warren.

Kerry Weinger- Partner of Baker & McKenzie LLP

With over 30 years of international experience, Kerry Weinger advises multinational employers on the tax, social security, employee benefits, compensation, employment law, and other legal issues related to the cross-border transfer of employees.  He represents and advises employers and management in a variety of international human resources matters such as implementing global stock plans, implementing global work force reductions, preparing cross-border employment and related agreements in tandem with international benefits and tax counseling.

Mr. Weinger will be leading the session The Mobile Employee: Navigating and Weathering the Global Laws Impacting Employee Mobility. It will be presented at the 5^th World Medical Tourism and Global Healthcare Congress and will also crossover with the Global Benefits Conference on October 24^th-26^th 2012.

Through the use of real life examples, this session will provide guidance for the multinational employer on recognizing and addressing the key global mobility issues presented in the international assignment of personnel, including who will be the employer, which employee benefits will apply, which employment laws will apply and the related tax planning and compliance.

Kerry is a member of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), OneWorld International Benefits Group, National Association of Stock Plan Professionals, Forum for Expatriate Management, International Fiscal Association, Bar and CPA Associations and past member of the Global Advisory Council of Worldwide ERC and the Executive Committee of the International Personnel Association.

Kerry practiced abroad for two and a half years in Brussels, Belgium.  He has lectured extensively before professional organizations around the world and has written several articles on international benefits, employment, tax, payroll and compensation issues.  Kerry also authored a book entitled U.S. Employees Abroad, published by Little, Brown & Company and Commerce Clearing House, co-authored the publication Employee Downsizing in Japan, and is a contributing author to the Thomson/West International Human Resources Guide.

Mr. Weinger graduated from the University of Illinois with a Bachelors of Science degree in Accountancy, received his Juris Doctor degree from Loyola University, and a Master of Laws degree in taxation from the John Marshall Law School.

To read Kerry’s full biography and for more information about the event including the complete conference agenda, please visit http://www.medicaltourismcongress.com

Jeffrey Chen – Executive Director of Insurance & Benefits, Insupro

Aging population, funding of social security, tax treatment and rising labor cost are all challenges of the benefit market environment in China. In a changing society, to design and manage a benefit program can be a very challenging task. Challenges and Trends – An Overview of Benefit Market in China is an educational session which will be presented at the 5^th World Medical Tourism and Global Healthcare Congress and will also crossover with the Global Benefits Conference. The workshop will first give an overview of the benefit market in China, explain the dynamics of the current market and teach solutions for China related benefit issues.

Jeffrey Chen is the founder and CEO of Insupro and will be leading this topic. He has 17 years of experiences in insurance underwriting, brokering and risk & benefit consulting. Jeffrey will explain how to design and implement the benefit program in China and the solutions to the challenges he’s faced.

Headquartered in Beijing, Insupro is a leading provider of comprehensive employee benefit solutions in China. Since inception in 2002, Insurpo has provided many well-known companies in China with whole-process services including employee benefit consulting, benefit/insurance brokering, employee experience improvement and benefit administration outsourcing.

Jeffrey is interested in the topics of global benefit, benefit technology and outsourcing.  He graduated from China University of Politics and Law and Shanghai Maritime University.  He was admitted as a member of Health Insurance Association of America.

To read Jeffrey’s full biography and for more information about the event including the complete conference agenda, please visit http://www.medicaltourismcongress.com

Robert DiCianni, Senior Vice President of Pan-American Life Insurance Group

Robert DiCianni will be leading the session “Benefits in the AnCeCa (Andean, Central American, and Caribbean) Region” at the 5^th World Medical Tourism & Global Healthcare Congress which crosses over with the Global Benefits Conference.

Mr. DiCianni oversees all the International Operations for Pan-American Life.  He is responsible for driving growth in the corporation through the design and implementation of strategies and policies pertaining to sales, operations, and human resources.

Mr. DiCianni has close to 25 years of experience in the insurance industry, almost 20 years of which have been focused in Latin America. He has extensive experience in local, regional, and home office roles. He has been a CEO of insurance companies in three different countries in Central and South America and Mexico, with diverse experiences ranging from starting a green field operation to successfully manage a turnaround situation.

Prior to joining Pan-American Life, Mr. DiCianni served as Vice President with MetLife International, managing MetLife’s corporate business throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. His past experience, he was with ALICO/AIG for over 20 years, where he had a track record of consistently delivering profitable growth. He had extensive experience in group underwriting, TCN/Expatriate business, and Multinational Pooling before concentrating in the Latin America region. Mr. DiCianni began his career as a Group Underwriter with Prudential.

His session will be a quick trip around AnCeCa, explaining current Employee Benefits trends, focusing on insurance benefits.  It will also attempt to provide insight as to new, emerging trends, and how Benefits plans are addressing the needs of employers, employees, and evolving out-of-country treatment alternatives. The learning objectives will include: learn the standard benefit plan designs in this region, get input as to how these designs may be evolving in the future and also learn how employers, providers, and insurers are responding to the varying levels of service and/or treatment that may be available in these countries.

Mr. DiCianni will cover a description of benefit plans in the markets, identification of challenges in the markets with these plans and how they’re responding and how quality-of-care issues and Medical Tourism are affecting benefits plans.

For more information about the event and to view the complete conference agenda, please visit http://www.medicaltourismcongress.com

Breckon Jones, Director of Health and Benefits at American Express

American Express’ Healthy Living & Wider Benefits Program has won several European and International awards and has received much public praise as an industry gold standard. The MTA is elated to announce that Breckon Jones will be a keynote speaker at the 5^th World Medical Tourism Congress and his presentation will crossover with the Global Benefits Conference.

Jones is the Director of Health and Benefits at American Express and is responsible for the (EMEA) region which includes Europe, Middle East and Africa. He joined American Express from Unilever, where he held the role of Employee Health and Wellness Manager, pioneering an innovative model for workplace health enhancement and culture change which influenced the UK Government’s policies on employee health. He has previously worked with major blue-chip companies in the Asia Pacific region as a corporate consultant, designing and developing health, safety and wellness initiatives.

His presentation will make a comment in favor of increasing investment in employee benefits, in particular health and wellness programs, in a climate of economic uncertainty in Europe. American Express health and benefits strategy will be highlighted as a case study where investment to promote greater awareness and appreciation of benefits can attract and retain top talent, increase engagement and drive up customer service excellence.

Jones was recognized in 2012 by Employee Benefits Magazine as one of the ‘Hot 100 Benefits Professionals’ in the United Kingdom and is the only Reward professional to have won the European Employee Benefits Most Effective Healthcare & Wellbeing Strategy award two years in a row and for two different employers. He lives in London and cycles to work most days.

The 5^th World Medical Tourism Congress  will take place this year on the beach in Ft. Lauderdale/Miami on October 24-26^th. The event is a platform for healthcare leaders, governments, employers, providers and academics to network and work together for the greater good of the international healthcare industry.

The Global Benefits Association has announced the launch of a global network of hospitals consisting of centers of excellence available to multinational employers and international insurance companies.

David Bryan, President of the Global Benefits Association, stated “One of the challenges multinational employers and insurers have experienced as they expand across borders is identifying centers of excellence and building a quality hospital network for their employees or insured.  It can be a daunting and almost impossible task for some multinationals or insurers to build this in house.  They have turned to the Global Benefits Association to take the lead with this as an industry wide project and solution.”

“When a multinational employer or insurer has a catastrophic medical case, it is not easy for them to identify the proper center of excellence, to ensure that pricing provided is transparent and the service provided to the patient follows “international standards.”   The current international networks available to multinational employers currently include all tiers of hospitals, not just centers of excellence, which makes it very difficult for the employer or insurer to choose where to refer the patient, as well as for the patient to identify the hospital they should receive care from.  The GBA’s Global Medical Network will provide a solution to this challenge.”

The Global Medical Centers of Excellence Network will be available to multinational employers and insurance companies at no cost, allowing a transparent cost and pass- through approach. This will make the Global Medical Network the first international center of excellence network in the global healthcare industry.

In addition, this Network will provide group buying power for multinational employers and insurers. Healthcare providers will not have to negotiate on an individual basis, the GBA will negotiate on behalf of the multinational employers and insurers, and pass along the negotiated savings to them.  With healthcare costs rising, GBA is committed to transparency in pricing for its members.

David Bryan also stated, “The Global Medical Network is an innovative project that will provide a solution to a much needed problem of access to quality care.  Multinational Employers will be able to reduce their expenses by not only eliminating the need to develop their own medical network, but also by saving from the cost of having to rent a global network. GBA is committed to developing more group buying solutions for multinationals and insurers in other areas of employee benefits.”

The GBA has partnered with the Medical Tourism Association to help identify Centers of Excellence and determine which hospitals have been accredited and certified, in both quality and international patient services. The joint efforts of the partnership will ensure nothing but the best outcomes for employees or insured utilizing the network. Only top tier hospitals will be allowed to participate in the network.

Renée-Marie Stephano, President of the Medical Tourism Association, responded, “It is important for healthcare consumers to have access to quality healthcare.  We are pleased to collaborate with the Global Benefits Association on this project as it is aligned with our tenets of transparency in quality, communication and education.”

The Global Medical Centers of Excellence Network will start contracting with hospitals in June .

About the Global Benefits Association

Headquartered in the United States with offices around the world, The Global Benefits Association (GBA) is the non-profit trade association for the Global Benefits and Expatriate Industry with it’s sole and primary focus being on health insurance, employee benefits and other insurance benefits that are delivered on an international basis and across borders. The Purpose of the Global Benefits Association is to provide a single authoritative voice for Multinational employers and insurers and to allow industry participants to collaborate, share best practices and network.

For more information contact

David Bryan

info@GlobalBenefitsAssociation.com