CAIRO: Healthcare partnerships between the public and the private sectors in Egypt has improved dramatically over the past few years, a conference concluded Wednesday, urging both sectors to capitalize on growing opportunities. The MENA Healthcare Infrastructure Investment and Finance Summit, held at Concord El Salam hotel in Cairo, brought together a wide range of high level industry specialists, who discussed the importance of the state of healthcare infrastructure and its current shortcomings in the MENA region They also discussed financing and planning healthcare facilities and services. The conference was divided into four different panel sessions, explaining the role of public-private partnerships (PPP) in driving change, and thus an efficient way to finance healthcare projects, citing successful examples of healthcare PPP's in the region. Hospital management waste was also discussed at the conference, where experts highlighted the important connection between managing hospital wastes and investing in hospitals, since health and the environment are also directly related. Experts also said that healthcare project development and medical tourism have changed and improved widely in the MENA region, urging private sector companies to direct more funds into medical tourism. In light of that matter, experts discussed the importance of building and developing government and private hospitals and medical facilities in the MENA region. Panel discussions also highlighted the important role of funding technology and research to develop healthcare infrastructure projects. It also focused on meeting consumers' demands for new health products.
