Does healthcare sector development affect inbound tourism? Evidence from ASEAN countries

Abstract

Using the concepts of medical tourism and travel medicine, this research note proposes healthcare sector development has a positive impact on inbound tourism. This hypothesis is tested with the data of ASEAN countries from 2000 to 2018. Because of the presence of cross-section dependence and heterogeneity, appropriate panel cointegration test, panel coefficient estimation method and panel Granger causality test are used. The findings indicate that (1) evidence of cointegration between inbound tourism and healthcare sector development is found when inbound tourism is the dependent variable and (2) there is a Granger causality from healthcare sector development to inbound tourism. The findings suggest that there are temporal relationships from healthcare sector development to inbound tourism in both short-run and long-run. In summary, healthcare sector development has an impact on inbound tourism.