Travel health and health tourism: A perspective of the subject of tourism

Abstract

The emphasis on travel health and health tourism shows a historic progress in tourism, which is the focus of tourism development under the post-modern society and post-tourism era, and as well as the mirror of the idea of Humanism in tourism. When the forms of tourism evolve from traditional ones, such as sightseeing tour and cultural tour, to health tourism, it pays more attention to both physical and mental health in the traveling, which shows the development in tourism, basing on the change from considering economic benefits simply to giving consideration to social benefits, ecological benefits, and human health. Travel health and health tourism are defined. The relationship between them are discussed and measures and suggestions to achieve them are also proposed. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.