Plastic Surgery Tourists Run Risk of Drug-Resistant Infection
The poor world economy has sparked interest in medical tourism. Medical tourism is the name given to the relatively new practice of traveling to a foreign country to undergo surgery. The primary reason medical tourists give for seeking surgical procedures overseas is cost. Even with the inclusion of airline tickets, hotel stays and meals, medical tourists say the cost of undergoing surgery in a Southeast Asian clinic can be thousands of dollars less expensive than undergoing the same procedure at a U.S. or Western European hospital. Unfortunately, Cleveland cosmetic surgeons and top government medical officers warn, you get what you pay for. Cosmetic surgery bargain hunters could wind up paying for cheap overseas surgery with their lives.
The potentially horrific repercussions of medical tourism hit home this summer when British plastic surgery tourists brought home a new superbug from Southeast Asia. Impossible to cure, the superbug is impervious even to the carbapenem antibiotics reserved by U.S. hospitals to treat the most antibiotic-resistant infections. Deep concern about the threat of the new superbug spreading worldwide prompted British researchers to track down the source of the life-threatening infection.
Researchers discovered 37 cases of the superbug in Britain. What patients had in common were recent trips to India, Pakistan or Bangladesh to undergo cosmetic surgery. Expanding their search to hospital patients in those nations, researchers discovered 44 cases of superbug infection in Indian hospitals with additional cases in Pakistan and Bangladesh. All three Southeast Asian countries are home to medical tourism industries that cater to plastic surgery patients in Europe and the United States.
Researchers surmise that differences in sanitary protocols, medical personnel training and professionalism, and government-oversight of drug production are likely contributors to development of this new superbug and the spread of the life-threatening infection to the U.S. and Western countries.
To be continued…