Top 10 Costa Rica

Costa Rica #2 of the 5 Top Medical Tourism Destinations

Medical tourism is where people travel abroad to receive medical treatments like cosmetic surgery, which they could not afford in their own country.

Those travelling abroad for such treatments usually come from developed countries, where treatments are very expensive. The UK and the US are two of the biggest markets. That said: wealthy people in countries with poor health sectors often travel to countries that offer better healthcare for major treatments.

When people travel abroad for medical treatments they have two main criteria: cost and quality of healthcare.

They are looking for a place that they can both get to and be treated in cheaply, but which has a top-class health sector so that they know they will be safe. Below are three destinations which meet the criteria for perfect medical tourism destinations, and as such are some of the most popular destinations with medical tourists.

Malaysia:

Malaysia was recently found to be the most popular medical tourism destination with the growing numbers of Asia’s wealthiest. They travel to Malaysia for major treatments because it has one of the best health services in, not only Asia, but the world.

Malaysia is also one of the most popular destinations with those travelling from English speaking destinations (US and UK). This is because, as an ex-British colony there is a high prevalence of English speakers in the health sector. Tourism from the two combines to make Malaysia one of the fastest growing medical tourism destinations, and well worth a property investment tailored to that market.

Costa Rica:

Costa Rica is massively popular with American medical tourists. Costa Rica disbanded the military in 1980 because of the safety and stability of the country. This makes people feel safe about visiting the country, but it also freed up billions of dollars to spend on education on healthcare.

For that reason Costa Rica now has one of the best, and most efficient health sectors in the world. Of the top destinations Costa Rica is also among the cheapest for procedures, which makes it very popular with medical tourists from around the world including the UK. (more…)

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Costa Rican bishops reject anti-Catholic and secularist bill

The Bishops’ Conference of Costa Rica announced Thursday that it completely rejects a bill that would modify the country’s constitution, remove a clause that establishes the Catholic faith as the Costa Rica’s religion and eliminate any reference to God in legal oaths.

The bishops said the measure that was proposed by the “Movement for a Secular State in Costa Rica” is being portrayed as “a means of safeguarding religious freedom” for Costa Ricans, when in reality the movement’s purpose is to take advantage “of this opportunity in order to push its own agenda.”

Some members of the movement, the bishops noted, “have shown themselves to be opposed to the values of the Gospel and the Christian ethics the Church teaches. Their marked particular interest prevents them from seeking the authentic common good and discredits them as supposed defenders of religious freedom in the country.”

They went on to stress that the current Constitution “has historically allowed for a healthy, respectful and balanced collaboration between Church and State in the interest of the integral development of our country. To affirm the contrary is to ignore history,” the bishops said.

Addressing the group’s intention to strip God from legal oaths, the bishops said it is evidence of a secularist agenda which is “opposed to the concept of the just autonomy of the political community and the Church and is understood as the exclusion of God and faith from the public sphere, reducing it to the private realm.”

For this reason, they added, “anti-religious prejudices, special interests and moral relativism are an expression of a myopia that denies any value of the transcendent dimension and of living the Christian faith.”

The bishops said their opposition to the bill was rooted “in the defense of principles and values that support authentic democracy and not in the search for supposed privileges, because a democracy without values…easily becomes a dictatorship and ends up betraying the people.”

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