Sustainability in health and wellness tourism: The creation of health regions

Abstract

Health and wellness tourism has been an area of research with several approaches in different geographical contexts (Cooper et al., 2023; Letunovska et al., 2020), although not with a very clear link to sustainability or its potential for territorial development. From a perspective of sustainability, this type of tourism has the potential to facilitate and contribute to the quality of life of communities from the moment it combines their different interests with those of visitors and respects the natural, cultural and economic resources of the territories. This balanced combination of factors is crucial for local and regional development, which is even more important for inland regions. Based on this assumption and considering that the Central region of Portugal is a centre of attraction for health and wellness tourism - where 50% of the country's thermal spas are located - the main aim of this research is to highlight the potential of health and wellness tourism for local and regional development.