Medical Tourism in Israel - Medical Tourism Wiki

Unreviewed Written 23 October 2026| 4 sources| The governing statute was read in the official English translation, section by section

Medical Tourism in Israel

A square within the Sheba Medical Center hospital complex in Israel — A square within the Sheba Medical Center complex. Under section 27 of the Medical Tourism Law, public institutions may not treat medical tourists during regular hours. Photograph by Unknown, CC BY 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons.

Verified against primary record
Governing statute	Medical Tourism Law 5778-2018, published in Reshumot Sefer HaChukim no. 2750^[1]
Commencement	Six months after publication, under section 74(a)^[1]
Priority rule	Institutions will not prioritise medical tourists over patients who are not medical tourists, under section 21^[1]
Regular hours	No medical treatment will be administered to a medical tourist during regular hours, with listed exceptions, under section 27(a)(1)^[1]
Clinician payment	Clinicians may not be paid more for treating a tourist than a non-tourist, under section 27(a)(3)^[1]
Facilitators	Must be registered; registration lasts four years and is renewable, under sections 2(a) and 7^[1]
Accounting and reporting	Separate recording of income and expenses, plus an annual report including a plan for using tourism revenue to strengthen services for other patients, under sections 23 and 25^[1]
Sanctions	Up to one year in prison or a fine for unregistered facilitation; a financial sanction of NIS 50,000 for listed violations, under sections 53 and 55^[1]
Medical tourism in the WHO health system profile	Not mentioned^[2]
Independently reported
Pre-legislation market estimate	Inflows of USD 100 million to 300 million a year, reported by a trade publication in 2016 as a market estimate^[4]
Bands apply only to the rows beneath them. Section references are to the official English translation of the statute, which may not be the authoritative Hebrew text. The source gives the publication date as 28 July 2018 in its header and 29 July 2018 in its footers, and both are recorded here without choosing between them. The pre-legislation money figure is a market estimate reported by a trade publication two years before the law passed, not an official statistic, and no official count of medical tourists in Israel was located. No typical cost range is given for the same reason.

Medical tourism in Israel is governed by primary legislation, which makes it unusual. Most countries that attract foreign patients regulate the activity, if at all, through hospital licensing or professional rules. Israel passed a dedicated statute, the Medical Tourism Law 5778-2018, which registers the brokers, keeps foreign patients out of public hospitals during ordinary working hours, forbids paying doctors more to treat them, and requires each institution to report annually on how it will spend the proceeds on everybody else.

Table of Contents

What the law defines

Section 1 defines a medical tourist as a tourist who is receiving or who is requesting to receive medical treatment in a medical institution in Israel, with tourist status resting on visa requirements under the Entry into Israel Law. The same section defines medical tourism facilitation as paid arrangements linking a tourist with an Israeli institution, or paid recruitment of tourists for an institution by an outside party.^[1]

Defining the broker rather than only the patient is what gives the statute its reach. Facilitation is the commercial layer that most national rules leave untouched, and in Israel it is the layer that carries the registration requirement and the criminal penalty.

Protecting residents first

Section 21 provides that institutions will not prioritise medical tourists over a patient who is not a medical tourist, and the prohibition covers treatment quality, appointment availability, resource allocation and auxiliary services. Section 22 separately requires that the quality of treatment given to tourists not be inferior to that given to other patients, so the rule runs in both directions.^[1]

Section 27(a)(1) goes further, providing that no medical treatment will be administered to a medical tourist during regular hours, with exceptions for emergencies and for treatment needed during a stay that is not the tourist’s main reason for coming. The Director may approve certain listed treatments during regular hours, but only if extra hours are added for non-tourist patients. Section 27(a)(3) provides that clinicians may not be paid more for treating a tourist than for treating a non-tourist.^[1]

Taken together these three provisions address the specific mechanism by which inbound medical tourism is alleged to harm residents elsewhere in the world: not the existence of foreign patients, but the diversion of theatre time, senior clinicians and premium pay towards them. Israel is one of the few jurisdictions to have legislated against that mechanism directly.

Section 50 allows the Director to order an institution to stop treating tourists or to limit the types of treatment, including where treating tourists may harm services for other patients. The statute as translated sets no numerical cap or quota on the number of tourists.^[1]

Registering the brokers

Section 2(a) provides that a person will not facilitate medical tourism unless registered with the Registry. Registration lasts four years and is renewable under section 7, and section 16 bars institutions from contracting with or paying unregistered facilitators. Website advertising by an outside party escapes registration only where the institution has absolute control over the content of the advertisement and the tourist pays no one but the institution, under section 2(c).^[1]

Agents must disclose personal interests and obtain written consent under section 12, may deal only with management designated by the institution’s director rather than with clinicians under section 13, and must wear an identification tag under section 14. Institutions must meet conditions under section 15, including that treating non-tourists is their main activity and that they can provide adequate care.^[1]

The rule barring agents from dealing with clinicians, and the requirement that treating residents be an institution’s main activity, are both attempts to stop a facility reorganising itself around foreign custom. Whether they have had that effect is not something the statute can show.

Accounting, reporting and penalties

Section 23 requires separate accounting of tourist treatment, with separate recording of income and expenses. Section 24 requires occupancy and service-availability data on the Director’s request. Section 25 requires an annual report including a plan for using tourism revenue to strengthen services for other patients.^[1]

That last requirement is the most distinctive provision in the law. It treats revenue from foreign patients not as ordinary institutional income but as something an institution must account for by showing what it did for its other patients with the money. No comparable duty was found in any other national instrument examined for this site.

Unregistered facilitation carries up to one year in prison or a fine under section 53, with double fines for corporations. Office holders must make concerted efforts to prevent violations, with a presumption of breach if violations occur, under section 54. A financial sanction of NIS 50,000 applies to listed violations, increased for ongoing violations at one fiftieth per day and for recurring violations, under sections 55 and 59. Agents face warnings, fines, restrictions, suspension or deletion under section 43, and the Director may delete or suspend registrations under section 49.^[1]

The law takes effect six months after publication under section 74(a), with facilitators already operating treated as registered if they apply within three months of that date under section 74(d).^[1]

The system the law sits in

The WHO European Observatory profile of Israel published on 4 December 2024, edited by Ruth Waitzberg, records a National Health Insurance system covering all residents regardless of whether contributions are paid, with four competing health plans acting as both providers and payers that operate nationwide and cannot reject enrollees. Foreign workers must buy private health insurance. Adult refugees, asylum seekers and undocumented migrants are not covered, though their children are if parents pay a monthly contribution.^[2]

The profile records health spending per person below the European Union average, particularly public spending, with out-of-pocket spending per person having fallen since 2005 to levels similar to the European Union. Voluntary health insurance plays a larger role than in the European Union and often funds private care, which the profile links to waiting times and distance and to widening disparities. In 2021, 5.7 per cent of households faced catastrophic health spending and 11 per cent of adults had unmet needs because of cost. Acute hospital bed numbers are low, about 25 per cent of doctors are over the retirement age of 67, and the nurse rate is already low.^[2]

The profile does not mention medical tourism, health tourism, foreign patients or international patients anywhere. Its only reference to foreigners concerns foreign workers’ insurance obligations and migrants’ coverage.^[2]

Israel’s profile belongs to the Health Systems in Action insight series, produced by WHO Europe with the European Observatory for 15 countries in the WHO European Region outside the European Union on a common template to support cross-country comparison, updated every two years. So the profile’s silence is the series template rather than an Israeli omission, and it stands in sharp contrast to the detailed statutory treatment the activity receives in Israeli law.^[3]

Before the law

Regulation was under discussion for years beforehand. A trade publication reported in October 2016 that the Ministry of Health was planning to require hospitals to record and report medical tourism figures through new regulations, with private and public hospitals submitting activity reports covering time and care spent on non-Israeli patients, patient numbers and revenue, and facilitators disclosing their business volume. It reported that if the ministry found hospitals favouring foreign patients over locals it could ban services to non-Israelis. The same report cited market estimates of medical tourism inflows of 100 million to 300 million United States dollars a year.^[4]

Several of those proposals became law in recognisable form two years later, which makes the report useful as regulatory history. The money figure does not have the same standing: it is a market estimate relayed by a trade publication, with no originating source named, and it is reported here as such rather than as a measure of the sector.^[4]

Limits of the evidence

The statute was read in an official English translation, and where a translation and the Hebrew original differ the Hebrew governs. The publication date is recorded inconsistently within the source itself and both versions are given. Nothing in this entry establishes how the law has been enforced: no register of facilitators, no ministry report under section 25, and no official count of medical tourists in Israel was located. The absence of enforcement data means the law is described here as written rather than as applied.

References

State of Israel. Medical Tourism Law 5778-2018, official English translation, published in Reshumot Sefer HaChukim no. 2750, 17 Av 5778. Verified against primary record: the translation was opened and the definitions of medical tourist, tourist and medical tourism facilitation in section 1, the facilitator registration requirement in section 2(a) and the website advertising exemption in section 2(c), the four-year renewable registration in section 7, the agent duties in sections 12 to 14, the institutional conditions in section 15, the bar on contracting with unregistered facilitators in section 16, the non-prioritisation rule in section 21 and the quality rule in section 22, the separate accounting duty in section 23, the data-on-request duty in section 24, the annual report and revenue plan duty in section 25, the prohibition on treating tourists during regular hours and its exceptions and the equal-pay-for-clinicians rule in section 27(a), the disciplinary measures in section 43, the registration deletion power in section 49, the power to halt or limit tourist treatment in section 50, the criminal penalty in section 53, the officer-holder duty in section 54, the financial sanctions in sections 55 and 59, and the commencement and transitional provisions in section 74 were read directly. The header gives the publication date as 28 July 2018 and the footers as 29 July 2018. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
Waitzberg, R. (ed.). Health systems in action 2024: Israel. European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and WHO Regional Office for Europe, 4 December 2024, 24 pages, ISBN 9789289059749. Verified against primary record: the publication entry was opened and the National Health Insurance coverage of all residents regardless of contribution payment, the four competing health plans acting as providers and payers that operate nationwide and cannot reject enrollees, the private insurance requirement for foreign workers, the exclusion of adult refugees, asylum seekers and undocumented migrants with coverage for their children on payment of a monthly contribution, health spending per person below the European Union average with public spending particularly low, the fall in out-of-pocket spending per person since 2005 to levels similar to the European Union, the larger role of voluntary health insurance and its link to private care, waiting times, distance and widening disparities, catastrophic health spending in 5.7 per cent of households and unmet needs due to cost among 11 per cent of adults in 2021, the 41 per cent of spending on ambulatory primary and preventive care, low acute hospital bed numbers, about 25 per cent of doctors being over the retirement age of 67, the low nurse rate, the southern region being most underserved, and the absence of any reference to medical tourism, health tourism, foreign patients or international patients were read directly. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
WHO Regional Office for Europe. WHO Europe and European Observatory launch Health Systems in Action insights for non-EU countries. 28 January 2025. Verified against primary record: the page was opened and the identity and producers of the series, its coverage of 15 non-EU countries in the WHO European Region including Israel, the stated purpose, the use of a common template to support cross-country comparison, the two-yearly update cycle and the sources drawn on were read directly. Retrieved 23 October 2026.
International Medical Travel Journal. Israeli hospitals must record medical tourism statistics. Published 6 October 2016, last modified 31 March 2021. Independently reported: the article was opened and the Ministry of Health plan to require hospitals to record and report medical tourism figures through new regulations with a possible new law, the proposed activity reports covering time and care spent on non-Israeli patients, patient numbers and revenue, the proposed disclosure duties for medical tourism agencies, the proposed power to ban services to non-Israelis where hospitals were found to favour foreign patients, and the citation of market estimates of inflows of USD 100 million to 300 million a year were read directly. The article names no originating source for the money estimate and gives no patient counts. Retrieved 23 October 2026.

Sourcing note: the bulk of this entry is drawn from the statute itself, read in the official English translation section by section, which is why section numbers are given throughout and can be checked. The translation is not the authoritative text and that is stated. The one money figure is a market estimate relayed by a trade publication before the law existed, named as such and kept out of the primary-record band. Nothing describes how the law has been enforced, because no enforcement record was located.

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