Medical tourism in Ireland, like in many Western states, is built around assumptions about individual agency, choice, possibility, and mobility. One specific form of medical tourism—the flow of women from Ireland traveling in order to secure an abortion—disrupts and contradicts these assumptions. One legacy of the bitter, contentious political and legal battles surrounding abortion in Ireland i...

Sexually transmissible diseases (STDs), the most common notifiable infectious conditions, remain major threats to reproductive and public health worldwide. Travelers are particularly vulnerable to STDs, because of voluntary or involuntary sexual behavior while abroad, and are significant vectors who introduce new pathogens and resistant strains to unaffected parts of the world. This article out...

From a geographical perspective, the article focuses on the sexual encounters of men who have sex with other men for money in Puerto Vallarta (Jalisco, Mexico). In these encounters, besides money, values, ideas, stereotypes and expectations circulate between clients and sex workers. In this context it explores (i) the process of consolidation of Vallarta as a gay “place” for international touri...

The tourism footprint family comprises the tourism ecological footprint (TEF), the tourism carbon footprint (TCF) and the tourism water footprint (TWF). The tourism footprint represents an important tool for quantitatively assessing the impact of tourism activities on the ecosystem of a tourist destination. This paper systematically reviews the relevant literature on TEF, TCF and TWF, analyses ...

Following the identification of medical tourism as a growth sector by the Malaysian government in 1998, significant government sector and private-sector investments have been channeled into its development over the past 15 years. This is unfolding within the broader context of social services being devolved to for-profit enterprises and 'market-capable' segments of society becoming sites of int...

Infectious disease threat events (IDTEs) are increasing in frequency worldwide. We analyzed underlying drivers of 116 IDTEs detected in Europe during 2008-2013 by epidemic intelligence at the European Centre of Disease Prevention and Control. Seventeen drivers were identified and categorized into 3 groups: globalization and environment, sociodemographic, and public health systems. A combination...

China tourism industry is investing to develop a “Golden Tourism Project”. One of the main objectives of this project is to improve web-based tourism online service quality and implement tourism e-commerce. In order to develop successfully the project it is necessary to investigate who are main tourism website users, what are their requirements for online tourism services and how do they assess...