The Malaysian Healthcare Travel Council, an agency under the finance ministry, will expand into Cambodia and Brunei, and build more awareness in Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait, said the council’s chief executive, Sherene Azli.

The council also expects to build new business from Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong, she said.

“The main challenge in breaking into any new market is building awareness of Malaysia’s healthcare facilities,” explained Sherene.

“While these countries may recognise Malaysia for other reasons such as being a world-class travel destination, our greatest challenge is to build awareness about the industry’s unique service offerings – which are internationally acknowledged to be among the top in the world,” she added.

She said the aim was to attract two million healthcare travellers this year, which is expected to bring in revenue of RM2 billion and contribute RM8 billion to the economy through ancillary services such as food, accommodation, transportation, leisure and tourism activities.

In 2018, about 1.2 million healthcare travellers visited Malaysia, spending RM1.5 billion in hospital receipts and producing an economic impact of RM6.4 billion.

Although global tourism will be affected by the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), Sherene said Malaysia’s strong foundation in pandemic preparedness means it will continue to remain an attractive proposition for healthcare travellers.