“Health tourism” in Kerala

By Kenneth Zysk

Another important medically important discovery that came from my visit to Kerala was the explosive growth of what people call “health tourism” that has taken place over the past five to seven years.

When I first came to Kerala in 1991, I could count the number of resorts offering a form of Ayurvedic rejuvenation therapy on one hand. In 2007, the numbers of increased exponentially. Each one is trying to out do the other to attract cliental from the west, primary Europe. They have been quite successful, especially people from Germany and Austria, where a long tradition of spas and healing baths has existed for centuries. They are lured by glossy brochures, well-produced CDs, and a sales pitch that claims that Ayurveda is the “world’s oldest system of healing and revitalising the body.”

When these health-seeking Europeans arrive at the Ayurveda health resorts, they find the accommodations quite to their liking, but the professional care is something else. Being accustomed to a very high level of professional treatment, they find to their great dismay that the level of care and treatment given by the Ayurvedic practitioners and health-care workers is quite inadequate, so that many of the European visitors return home worse that when they started. This serves as a word of caution to those who might be tempted to visit an Ayurvedic spa in India. Investigate the level of professional care before signing up for a session.

The phenomenon of “health tourism” has not yet found its way to Tamilnadu and the Siddha tradition, but many predict that it is just around the corner.