March 27 (Bloomberg) -- The only way Bridget Flanagan, a 21-year-old college student from Olympia, Washington, could afford the obesity surgery she needed was to go to Mexico. Her health insurance didn't cover the treatment.
Traveling 2,000 miles for gastric banding surgery at Hospital San Jose in Monterrey, Mexico, saved her $6,600, making it affordable. The procedure was a success, allowing five-foot- tall Bridget to drop 45 pounds so far off her peak weight of 275.
Health-care companies and investors see a new market in patients like Flanagan. Tecnologico de Monterrey, the private university that owns San Jose Hospital, plans a $100 million medical center in Monterrey. Grupo Star Medica, the builder of seven Mexican centers in five years, is accelerating an expansion aimed at Americans, funded partly by billionaire Carlos Slim.
``This is a great opportunity not only for Mexico, but also to reduce health costs in the U.S.,'' said Marco Antonio Slim Domit, Carlos Slim's son and chief executive officer of his Mexico City brokerage Grupo Financiero Inbursa SAB. The firm took an undisclosed stake in Star Medica, a privately held hospital chain based in Morelia, Michoacan, in southern Mexico.
While Mexican authorities declined to estimate how much the country's health-care industry is expanding to handle medical tourism, companies are building new hospitals, clinics and surgical centers.
Importance: The market for medicine appears to be much more competitive than Mexico's other markets like oil and telecommunications. Marketing toward foreign patients is a great opportunity for Mexico, and its location of just south of the U.S. makes it much more practical for American citizens than places like India and Singapore who have also attempted attracting foreign patients. Mexico's actions only highlight the level of globalization that the world has come to or at least is fast approaching.
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