BRITISH patients are being enticed to jump NHS queues and travel to India for cut-price medical treatment.

Travel operators are set to launch package tours to Indian hospitals later this year. Thomas Cook India and other major tour companies will offer return flights, an operation at a Bombay hospital, and post-operative sightseeing at South Indian temples or recuperation on the beach at Goa.

The packages are part of a drive by the new Medical Tourism Council of Maharashtra to sell Indian hospitals as a cheaper, quality alternative to a long wait on the NHS.

Indian doctors estimate that heart surgery costs an average £30,000 in Britain but only £6,000 in Bombay. The saving is comparable for other non-emergency treatment such as joint replacement, neurosurgery and cancer treatment.

Patients will be able to choose their doctor and hospital on a website in Britain and will be met at the airport on arrival in Bombay and taken to the hospital of their choice.

The medical tourism council was set up in November to market private Indian hospitals in Bombay, which claim operations cost about a fifth or less of the British price.

Sushil Jiwarajka, the chairman of the Indian Chambers of Commerce in Bombay and a key backer of the marketing drive, said: “This is a chance for patients to jump the queues and get world-class medical treatment at a fraction of what it costs in Britain.

“A lot of Indians living in the UK are already coming here, but we think we can reach a much wider market.

“We want to set up a full package covering everything. The details of doctors will be posted on a website so patients can make an informed decision before they leave the UK. We will help to deal with immigration formalities. And there will be a fully equipped ambulance and someone to help the patients when they arrive here.

“Basically we will hold their hand all the way through the experience.

“Afterwards when they are recovering, we have some of the best beaches in the world, beautiful places for meditation holidays, or wonderful hills.”

Cox and Kings, an upmarket specialist travel company, and Taj Hotels, owners of the Taj Mahal hotel in Bombay, also plan to launch packages with the backing of the Maharashtra State Government’s Tourism and Health Ministries.

Doctors from some of Bombay’s best hospitals say that about 500 foreign patients, mainly from the Middle East and South-East Asia, are already being treated daily in the city and medical tourism is fuelling growth in India’s medical sector and promises to become one of the country’s biggest earners.

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