China’s health department will pay for 120 of the nation’s children suffering from respiratory diseases to be treated at a Czech mineral water spa in Karlova Studánka as part of an agreement between the countries’ leaders to boost wellness tourism in eastern Europe.

Czech health minister Svatopluk Nemecek signed the agreement to care for the children during President Miloš Zeman's recent visit to China.

Nemecek also signed a memorandum on strategic co-operation between the two countries’ health systems and an agreement on Chinese support and funding for a clinic of traditional Chinese medicine in the Czech Republic. This clinic will be located at the teaching hospital in Hradec Hradec Králové, east Bohemia.

"The project of traditional Chinese medicine in Hradec Králové will become a project of reference for other Central and Eastern European countries," said Nemecek.

The co-operation deal between the two countries, to promote mineral water spas in the Czech Republic, is expected to boost the number of Chinese wellness tourists in the eastern European region. Czech spas Lázne Velichovky and Lázne Bohdanec will work with Xiangya University Hospital and the Health Department of Hunan Province – both in China. Health offices of the Chinese cities of Tianjin and Shanghai are also interested in investing in the project.

Earlier this year, China proposed that Czech-Chinese co-operation in healthcare and wellness should expand to 16 central and east European Countries. Spa Business contributor Sophie Benge has written a series of articles on the healing techniques used in eastern European spas here.

In August, a health panel was formed as part of the Local Leaders Meeting/China Investment Forum with representatives of both ministries, Czech and Chinese businesspeople and health professionals. An agreement on the first health summit of central and east European countries and China has also been signed.

In June, The Czech Constitutional court scrapped a national Health Ministry directive limiting the volume of medical spa care covered by health insurers, in a move designed to stem the significant losses being incurred by wellness facilities. The directive will become void from 2015, with a new piece of legislation to be passed in the interim. Plans to change the system are expected to be more favourable for both patients and spa operators.