Medical Tourists Flock to Thailand Spurring Post-Coup Economy

Monica Topliss pauses while eating breakfast in her Bangkok hotel to explain why she flew 7,300 kilometers from her home in Australia to go under a Thai plastic surgeon’s knife.

“The whole thing, airfares and hotel included, cost me 15,000 Australian dollars ($13,050), when back home, it would have been twice as much,” Topliss, a 48-year-old executive chef and author of cookbooks, says of the breast enhancement procedures and cosmetic dentistry she has just undergone. “And the surgeon did such a good job. It’s like the clock has been turned back 20 years. What’s more, I’m having a wonderful two-week holiday as well. Even the hospitals are like five-star hotels.”