Like most women, I used to snigger along with the old gag that the primary function of breasts is to make males stupid. But now the joke has rather backfired. Those behaving most idiotically over breasts these days are overwhelmingly female, and I don’t even mean Jodie Marsh. In a survey once, a “tit job” came among the top ten of things that women said would make them happier. World peace, if you’re wondering, didn’t figure.
Another study this month by a cosmetic-surgery clinic revealed that three quarters of people think breast surgery leaves no scars. Eh? How do they think those wobbly implants get in – via Paul Daniels’ magic wand? More than half said getting a bargain operation was more important to them than the surgeon’s credentials. Never mind the quality, boys, feel the width!
Clearly we are now so complacent that we believe that a nip and tuck is no more serious than an eyebrow pluck and we can be up glugging piña coladas an hour after the bandages come off.
Which could be music to the ears of Easylook, a new no-frills clinic in Geneva that hopes to do for cosmetic surgery what Ryanair did for cheap flights. Breast enlargement is £2,700 compared to about £5,700 here; a facelift is £3,100 as opposed to £7,750. Costs are kept down by eliminating unnecessary luxuries. Like anaesthetic. Ha. Just kidding. But don’t expect a TV, flowers or a telephone in your room. “When you’ve had an operation, you don’t care if there’s a Gauguin on the wall or if the director has a new Mercedes,” says spokesman Tom Gyger. Oh, but Mr Gyger, I do. If I ever lose my mind and go under the knife, I want my surgeon to have a fleet of Ferraris, a Rolex and a Lear jet because that suggests he hasn’t had his ass sued off by a disfigured ex-patient.
I’m not suggesting Easylook’s ops are not of the highest standard. In fact, Gyger says the only costs he cuts are the frills, not those related to safety. But the Royal College of Surgeons seems worried generally and says, darkly, that cost-cutting can affect health and safety.
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Personally, I fear more for our sanity. I can’t believe that people still have lip injections when Leslie Ash resembles a Tweenie. Or that they have Botox injections to paralyse their facial muscles; I thought that was called a stroke. The grotesque nature of many cosmetic procedures was summarised for me years ago when a former colleague went to interview the former Coronation Street actress Lynne Perrie (Ivy Tilsley to you). In a quest for youth she was having fat from fleshier parts of her body injected into her face. As my friend was about to leave, she puckered up and insisted he give her a kiss. “Guess what, love,” she said. “You’ve just kissed my arse.”
As a final word on the subject, I cannot improve on that.
bargainhunter@thetimes.co.uk