KUCHING: Malaysia is well positioned to tap into growing healthcare expenditure which could exceed US$20 billion by the year 2025, says Frost & Sullivan, growing at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11 per cent within the nest five years.
While Government spending will focus on development of public healthcare infrastructure and chronic and infectious diseases control and treatment, private healthcare spending will drive much of this growth, it said in a statement yesterday.
“Furthermore, private healthcare (out of pocket, private health insurance) will grow from 46 per cent of total healthcare expenditure to close to 50 per cent by 2020,” it predicted.
Healthcare services and medical devices provide the largest near term opportunities in Malaysia, while new sectors of growth are in home healthcare, aged care and medical technology.
“Malaysia provides affordable, high quality healthcare. Enhancement of our capabilities in medical devices manufacturing with stronger emphasis on use of Made in Malaysia medical products could help to control this unavoidable increase in healthcare costs.
With our growing middle aged and elderly population, as well as increased awareness on the importance of healthcare management, we see a trend also in earlier diagnosis, leading to the ability to manage diseases better,” says Rhenu Bhuller, Senior Vice President, Healthcare, Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific.
Other areas of growth for Malaysia are medical tourism as well as in primary healthcare services.
Frost & Sullivan noted the formation of the Asean Economic Community (AEC) provides the opportunity to reduce medical devices import proportion.
The medical device market in Asean is heavily reliant on imports, especially for high end and sophisticated medical equipment.
“In the major economies of Asean, the value of medical device sales to healthcare facilities was worth US$4 billion in 2013, and is projected to more than double by 2019.
“With the AEC and Government’s advocating local manufacturing, Frost & Sullivan forecasts a five per cent drop in the proportion of domestic markets met by imports, although the value of the market will grow strongly to continue to provide significant spend on imports.
With medical devices manufacturing being emphasized as one of the key areas of focus in Malaysia, the country is moving up the value chain in the production of medical devices. High-value devices being manufactured in Malaysia include orthopaedic products, dialysers, surgical instruments, medical electrodes, diagnostic radiographic equipment, and ophthalmic lenses.”
Meanwhile, Frosty & Sullivan noted that medical tourism continues to grow in Malaysia. Compared to other countries in Asean, Malaysia has a higher-than-average availability of medical personnel and high quality facilities providing treatments across different ranges of the cost spectrum, making it an attractive destination for medical tourists.
“While Thailand and Singapore will continue to be larger in terms of dollar size, they are forecasted to see slower growth over the next five years, compared to Malaysia’s forecasted CAGR of 18.5 per cent between 2014 and 2020.
“Singapore will come under pressure due to the costs of healthcare there, while Thailand has seen an impact of the political unrest. Malaysia has the opportunity to brand and position itself as a provider of affordable, quality healthcare.
“Another factor that is changing the medical tourism landscape is the emergence of new medical tourism hubs like Indonesia and the Philippines.”
source:the borneo post