I. Glenn Cohen, Editor. The Globalization of Health Care: Legal and Ethical Issues. 2013. New York: Oxford University Press. $95.00. pp. 480. Hardcover. ISBN‐10: 0199917906.

• Author: Arnauld Nicogossian
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/wmh3.90
• Published date: 01 June 2014
• Date: 01 June 2014

Book Review

I. Glenn Cohen, Editor. The Globalization of Health Care: Legal and Ethical Issues.

2013. New York: Oxford University Press. $95.00. pp. 480. Hardcover. ISBN-10:

0199917906.

The Globalization of Health Care: Legal and Ethical Issues addresses many

relatively recent developments and pressing international legal and ethical

concerns. Professor Cohen introduces the essays collected in this book by stating

that the globalization of the health-care market has taken many forms, resulting

in complex interactions. The premise is that health-care services and clinical trials

will claim an ever-increasing share of globalizing commerce and entrepreneur-

ship. These assumptions are justif‌ied by current estimates, that by 2019 the global

health-care market is on a trajectory to reach 32 billion USD, including medical

information technology (IT), and home healthcare. The health-care industry is

expanding, seeking new markets, outlets, and opportunities for investments and

growth. Outsourcing health care, medical education, and offshore biomedical

trials are becoming very attractive and prof‌itable services (Casey, Crooks, Snyder,

& Turner 2013). Offers of low-cost transportation, tourism, and on-demand

competent health-care packages attract patients from countries where long wait

times and affordability are becoming a serious problem (Freyer & Kim, 2014).

Professor Cohen points out that the time is right for an ethical and legal

examination of global health-care services.

In Part I of this book, the authors argue that rising health-care costs and

accessibility are shaping medical tourism, both within and outside national

borders. This nascent, yet lucrative, industry is competing with costlier in-country

medical services faced by many patients of market economy countries. Medical

tourism is a growing multi-billion-dollar industry involving an ever-increasing

number of health insurers, consumer-patients, and also intermediaries helping

with travel and accommodation arrangements. Continued advances in medical

knowledge and worldwide access to information technologies (IT), accelerate

transformation and the construct of traditional practices, whereas developing

nations are now more economically competitive in health-care services. Thus

medical tourism, coupled with advances in transportation, medical IT, and less

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1948-4682 #2014 Policy Studies Organization

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