Health tourism sector aims to boost revenue to $6 billion this year

ISTANBUL

The Turkish health tourism sector aims to increase its revenue to $6 billion this year by drawing 2.5 million foreign patients.

In a report, the Trade Ministry said the number of health tourists visiting Türkiye increased sixfold between 2012 and 2024, reaching 1.5 million last year, while the health tourism export revenue quadrupled over the same period to hit $3 billion.

The rapid momentum gained in health tourism has been significantly influenced not only by the quality of health care in Türkiye but also by the support provided by the Trade Ministry, according to Elif Ural, member of the Health Services Committee of the Service Exporters’ Association and board member of the Association of Turkish Travel Agencies (TÜRSAB).

In 2022, the expansion of incentives originally granted to healthcare investors to also include health tourism agencies had an impact on 1,270 such agencies across the country, Ural noted.

“Thanks to the international patients brought in by those agencies, the hard currency inflow into the sector and the country has visibly increased,” she said.

They aim to attract 2.5 million health tourists in 2025 and generate a revenue of $6 billion, Ural added, noting that Türkiye can achieve sustainable momentum in health tourism.

“If other branches of health tourism in our country — such as thermal resources, senior tourism, accessible tourism, and wellness tourism — gain more traction, we believe we can reach our 2030 targets more quickly.”

In an interview in May, Emin Çakmak from the Turkish Health Care Travel Council (THTDC) stated that the goal for 2030 is to host 2.5 million health tourists and generate $25 billion in revenue from this sector.

According to the latest data available, some 354,457 people traveled to Türkiye to receive health care services in the January-March period of 2025.

Revenue from health tourism in the first four months of the year amounted to $643.4 million, corresponding to 6.9 percent of Türkiye’s total tourism revenue in the same period.