Fw: The high price of beauty ~ The Herald, UK

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From: " Ilena Rose " <ilena@...>

Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2001 10:54 AM

Subject: The high price of beauty ~ The Herald, UK

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http://www.theherald.co.uk/perspective/archive/22-3-19101-21-34-6.html

The high price of beauty

LORNA MacLAREN talks to the woman behind the historic EU ruling on breast

implants

MARGO Cameron is not opposed to cosmetic surgery. Her attitude to breast

enhancement is that if you really want bigger boobs, then go for it. What

she does object to is that for over a decade women have been sold implant

products which, she claims, have cost countless individuals their health,

their marriages, their peace of mind, and in some cases even their lives.

Long branded a hysterical female, she is happy to reel off insults and

death threats aimed her way during a long and bloody crusade to bring the

breast implant debate into the public domain.

" Paranoid, delusional, mad, and a downright nutter, you name it, I've been

called it, and by some very powerful people, " she says cheerfully.

" Nothing has ever stopped me. I am confident this saga will be looked on

historically as one of the worst examples of corporate greed outweighing

public safety there has ever been. "

Her sole aim, to have silicone implants outlawed, is the driving force

that evolved into yesterday's action in the European parliament, a move

which she and her colleagues at the Silicone Support UK organisation she

founded seven years ago believe is the closest step yet to achieving a

total ban.

New safety recommendations, presented by Erkki Liikanen, EU enterprise

commissioner, include independent pre- and post-surgery counselling; a

register of qualified plastic surgeons; national registers of every

operation carried out in all 15 EU member states; and major studies to

establish the precise health risks of implants.

Cameron's battle against the might of the cosmetic surgery industry, from

US manufacturing giants to pro-implant medical professionals, has helped

wreck her personal life. Suffering poisoning after having silicone

injections to her lips 11 years ago, her poor health, including multiple

sclerosis, connective tissue disease, nerve damage, and bone disease, has

left her thin and sapped of energy.

At her Glasgow home, Cameron, 46, is fielding telephone calls from the

press requesting quotes following the European parliament decision. Even

after exhaustion forced her to hand over control of her support group to

London-based campaigner on, a year on it is still

Cameron the media clamour to speak to.

" I try to keep a low profile these days but as you can see it's

impossible, " she says. " The news from Brussels is good. We've come a long

way from when I started and felt like a lone voice daring to ask why I was

so ill. "

Although supposedly retired from her campaigning days, Cameron still works

at her own pace behind the scenes, her latest contribution being the

unearthing of a breakthrough at London's Royal Free Hospital which reports

it has found silicone in the saliva of people who have had implants placed

in their calf muscles, a cosmetic procedure which improves the shape of

their legs.

" This goes a long way to proving that silicone does migrate through the

body, a fact which the majority of experts have denied, " says Cameron.

Over the years she was also one of the first in this country to highlight

US studies into silicone leakage into mother's breast milk and how that

subsequently affects infants.

Silicone Support additionally helped hundreds of Scots women seek legal

aid for compensation after American giant, the Dow Corning Corporation,

makers of silicone gel implants, buckled under a deluge of lawsuits and

set aside £2bn for claimants from the US and abroad.

To be so dedicated, surely the interest of this formerly happy-go-lucky

woman must verge on the obsessive? She agrees.

" I couldn't have done it otherwise. What's the fun in trawling the

internet until your eyes are sore to glean information on ruptured

implants? The women I talk to have stories of misery that almost broke my

heart. I don't get paid and mostly have been viewed with suspicion and

ridicule. " She shrugs. " I have to do this. It's too big an outrage to

leave alone. "

Cameron is a force to be reckoned with, but when it comes to her personal

life the firm voice becomes softer and she talks with regret, not

bitterness, about the decision which was to change her fate forever.

From looking forward to marriage to a man she loved and a comfortable life

together, her future was to be scraping by on Income Support while

struggling to maintain her deteriorating health.

In London in 1990 the future looked bright, with fiancÈ , a

financial consultant, and son , aged eight at the time. She

contacted a Harley Street physician with the intention of having an £600

lip-plumping course to give herself the pouting appearance favoured today

by celebrities like Patsy Kensit and Liz Hurley.

Cameron was planning her wedding and wanted a new look for the occasion.

" Collagen didn't work with me. My body kept absorbing it, so the doctor

suggested injecting silicone into my lips. He assured me it was safe and

that it would give me the look I desired. Like a fool I said go ahead. "

Yet there was no licence to inject silicone into the body, a fact she was

not to find out until years later.

" I can still remember every detail of the treatment which poisoned me, "

she says. " I was laughing and smiling as it was carried out. was in

the room during one session and he became quite upset and told me not to

hurt myself and that the 'jags' were bad for me.

" I tried to reassure him but, God, how I wish I'd listened to my son that

day. It was as though he instinctively knew I was being harmed. "

Just three months after the procedure, Cameron recalls feeling deeply

tired and run down. She was gradually changing from an out-going,

energetic woman working as a beauty therapist, to sleeping through the

day, having extreme mood swings, and taking no interest in her

surroundings.

EventuallyÝcracks started to appear in her relationship. " was a

wonderful and understanding man, but I couldn't carry on with the wedding

feeling as I did. I was being fobbed off by doctors who told me I was

depressed and tried to give me tranquillisers. For a while I thought I was

going mad. I developed a terrible rash and felt really sick. My

personality changed and it destroyed my relationship with a man I loved

deeply and who did nothing but try to support me. "

On a recuperative trip to America, she came upon information which showed

her the doctor she had trusted should never have been injecting silicone

into body tissue. In fact, to have done so was illegal in most countries.

She was then diagnosed by an American doctor as having silicone poisoning.

When her shock turned to anger she began contacting US anti-silicone

support groups, and, armed with information and invaluable contacts, she

returned to her native Glasgow where she organised the birth of Silicone

Support UK, the first group of its kind in Britain.

" I was shocked at how many people contacted me in those early days -

suicidal, ill, with no-one believing them, medics laughing them out of the

surgery, " she said.

" I'm sad to say that there are still women out there, some with too little

cash to have ruptured implants removed, trying to keep their lives

together.

Meanwhile, Cameron, always the reluctant crusader, admits she'd have

rather spent her days without the responsibility, travelling with loved

ones and living life to the full. But she is on new medication and feeling

a little less frail than she did last year.

" I have known women destroyed due to silicone, all because they innocently

bought a product that was supposed to be safe to boost their bustline. All

I ever wanted to do was to find out why I was sick and then let others

know they were not alone, or mad or stupid.

" I won't rest until we've won. "

* More than 4.5 million visitors worldwide have contacted the website,

www.silicone holocaust.org, to gain access to information collated by

support groups across the world including the US, European, Canada, and

Japan.

- March 22