South African Netcare gives up on British health prospects

March 28 (Reuters) - South African private healthcareoperator Netcare drew a line under its ambitions inBritain on Wednesday, saying it would exit the market due todifficult trading conditions.

Netcare shares were up 7.7 percent at 1349 GMT following theannouncement by South Africa's third-largest private hospitalchain, which has been in Britain for a decade through acontrolling stake in BMI Healthcare.

The company, which in September made an all-share offer tobuy out minority BMI Healthcare shareholders said it was makingthe move because trading conditions "remained difficult" acrossthe private healthcare market.

It said a poor performance by BMI Healthcare was the resultof National Health Service (NHS) demand management initiativesand weaker private medical insurance demand.

Netcare said in November it would restructure its Britishoperations, after reporting a drop in annual profit due in partto belt-tightening by Britain's publicly funded healthcaresystem.

The NHS, which has been operating with an over 1 billionpound deficit and a shortage of beds and staff, has been seekinghelp from private companies such as BMI Healthcare, SpireHealthcare and Nuffield Health.

However, the total NHS caseload at BMI Healthcare dropped by4.4 percent year-on-year for the 5 months to the end of Februarydue to "stringent demand management strategies" Netcare said.

Netcare expects the core earnings (EBITDA) margin in theBritish business to be between 0.8-1.2 percent in the first halfof 2018, down from 5.2 percent in the prior period.

Netcare reiterated that underlying trading EBITDA marginsacross the group are expected to remain broadly flat in thefirst half of 2018 from a year earlier.(Reporting by Justin George Varghese in BengaluruEditing by Alexander Smith)