U.S. companies consider overseas medical treatment for employees

According to the National Coalition on Health Care (NCHC), the number of Americans who are travelling overseas for medical treatment reached somewhere in the region of 500,000 last year.

Asian hospitals in Thailand, India and Singapore have attracted American medical tourists seeking cosmetic surgery for a number of years but now a large number of uninsured Americans are going abroad for high-quality heart, knee and back surgery.

The NCHC says outsourcing health services to the developing world is now being considered by big businesses and insurance companies.

It is seen as a natural extension of the competition faced by many companies in other aspects of their business and American hospitals already import foreign doctors and nurses and some use countries such as India for X-ray readings and other diagnostics.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, costs for employer-sponsored health premiums have increased by 87 percent over the last six years and family health coverage now costs in the region of $11,500 annually, with each worker contributing almost $3,000 themselves.

But many are unhappy with the development of such procedures and are determined to fight the possibility of a mass exodus of Americans seeking low-cost health care in foreign countries.

When the U.S. company Blue Ridge Paper Products Inc., was about to send one of its employees to India for a gall bladder operation the United Steelworkers, America's largest union, entered the fray and opposed the move.

A union spokesman said the union did not want it's members exposed to the risks associated with receiving health care in the Third World.

Blue Ridge then dropped the plan for it's union members, but several other U.S. businesses and insurance companies are starting to explore the option of exporting patients.