TEHRAN – A delegation comprising representatives of renowned Irish travel agencies and media outlets have commenced a ten-day familiarization tour across Iran with the aim of getting acquainted with its potential in terms of medical tourism, tourist destinations, natural landscapes, local people and their traditions.

“A five-member delegation comprising the head of the Irish union of travel agencies, senior executives and correspondents arrived in Iran on Shahrivar 22 [Sept. 13] in a 10-day tour set to familiarize them with the country’s tourism potential,” Mohammad-Ebrahim Larijani, the director of advertising and marketing office of the Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Ministry, was quoted by ISNA as saying on Saturday.

Organized by the private sector, the tour is scheduled to visit Tehran, Isfahan and Yazd as its main destinations, Larijani added.

The Irish delegation is also aimed to become familiar with medical tourism of the country, so they will pay visits to an infertility center in Yazd, an orthopedics center in Shiraz and an ophthalmology hub in Tehran.

The Islamic Republic hosted a record high of nearly 600,000 medical travelers during the first four months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-July 21), nearly equal to the figure for the whole past year (March 2018-19), according to an Iranian association for the health tourism promotion.

People from the Persian Gulf littoral states, Iraq and Syria as well as Iranian expatriates residing in Canada and Germany constituted the majority of medical travelers to the Islamic Republic, who received plastic, cosmetic, open-heart and orthopedic surgeries amongst other treatments.

AFM/MG