The Medical Tourism Movement in Nevada: Dollar Signs and Disease

Most Americans associate medical tourism with travel to other countries.  But if an odd alliance of Nevada state legislators, anti-aging doctors, and alternative healthcare providers succeeds, the sick and the dying from around the nation will be arriving in cities such as Reno and Las Vegas to pay for treatments that defy accepted medical  standards and won't be available in any other state.  Since ordinary medical doctors are prevented by law, not to mention medical ethics, from prescribing untested drugs and using unscientific devices, Nevada legislators set up this ostensibly lucrative scheme by placing the supervision of medical research and treatment in the hands of a unique coalition of homeopaths.  What distinguishes these homeopaths from most physicians is not only that they appear to be opposed to scientific investigation and federal regulation, but also that many of them have been disciplined by medical boards or have lost their medical licenses in other states.  And what distinguishes Nevada from every other other state in the country, including those that license homeopaths, is that its medical board permits doctors who are accused of misconduct to determine which laws should or should not apply to their case.

"Las Vegas is No. 1 as a tourist destination, No. 1 as a shopping destination. The reality is we believe in two years we can make Las Vegas the No.1 destination for alternative medicine," unlicensed pharmacist Dean Friesen, President, Nevada Institutional Review Board, Director, New Hope Medical Clinic, 12/2/05.