Comment: Brenda Power: What’s the real cost of that nip’n’tuck?

The cosmetic-surgery industry in this country expects a 200% augmentation from maturing SSIAs and their even-more maturing holders. Already the industry here is estimated to be worth an annual €50m, so it is braced for a truly pneumatic expansion if all those who have expressed an intention to treat themselves to surgery go ahead. And it’s probably safe to assume a gap between the number admitting to planning a cosmetic surgery spree with their loot and those actually intending to sneak off for some discreet remodelling. Procedures have become so commonplace that “having work done” is no longer seen as a cause for discretion or embarrassment, perhaps because the results are so dramatic it’s not as if you can deny it.

For years we’ve been listening to models and actresses banging on about how their diet and exercise regimes kept them looking young, and how we could all be similarly ageless if only we’d get off our cellulite-pocked bottoms and buy their workout DVDs and diet books. Now, one by one, they’re holding up their hands and admitting that diet and exercise had little to do with their skin tone and body shape and plenty to do with the thousands they paid to cosmetic surgeons to sandblast their faces and rearrange their ribcages.

Jane Fonda made a fortune in the 1980s from flogging her keep-fit videos, and now it turns out her ageless appearance was more labour intensive than the Port Tunnel. Cindy Crawford has been the face of various unctions and miracle cosmetics for years — now she, too, has revealed having had Botox and fillers injected into her face. It is no wonder then that some of us questioned Anneka Rice, who appeared on The Late Late Show some months ago promoting wonder vitamins that, she said, explained her enduring good looks.

Any suspiciously wide-eyed pretence that might have lingered around the unlikely appearance of ageing beauties was destroyed last week by the publication of those extraordinary pictures of the original Charlie’s Angels trio. All three are pushing 60 and none looks much like a woman on the verge of qualifying for a bus pass. Their faces and bodies are unashamed testimony to the skill of their plastic surgeons, and only Farrah Fawcett has that puffed and pulled look associated with multiple procedures.

It’s difficult to imagine the amount of pain and effort those women endured to make themselves look like thirtysomethings. A full facelift inflicts the same injuries — the bruising, broken bones, lacerated skin — as a 40mph car crash or a fall from a three-storey building. As you age, the healing process degenerates. There’s a good chance those women suffer constant aches or discomfort as a result of what they’ve put themselves through, all to look ridiculously young.

There’s nothing wrong with erasing the signs of tiredness from an ageing face, or reversing the effects of sun damage or adjusting the impact of gravity if it’s been particularly harsh.

That’s probably what most of our SSIA cosmetic surgery candidates are hoping to achieve. Non-surgical procedures, of the kind you can obtain from the clinics advertising over 16 pages in the Golden Pages, are relatively uncomplicated and affordable. They don’t change your appearance, they simply refresh it. For a €500 syringe of an injectable filler you can erase frown lines, plump up thinning lips, fill out fine wrinkles.

If an expensive suit or a designer hairstyle could shave a decade off your appearance, few of us would quibble with the expense. And if it makes you feel confident and relaxed, then it’s a better investment than a holiday.

Anyway, resistance is pointless. If you choose to look your age, then women in particular are accused of “letting themselves go”. And if you’re blessed with naturally youthful looks and good bones, everyone’s going to suspect you’ve had the works. You’re not going to beat the advocates and devotees of cosmetic surgery, so you might as well join them.

Except the cosmetic-surgery business does not look like it will be satisfied for long with helping us look good for our age. Where celebrities lead, the rest of us gullible western consumers inevitably follow, and the worrying appearance of Charlie’s Angels suggests that the industry trend is towards dramatically reversing the ageing process. Not slowing or even stalling it, but actually turning the clock back by up to 30 years.

The late Grace Kelly, for example, was no stranger to the surgeon’s knife, but she still looked her age. But actresses these days blithely try to convince us they’re mere slips of girls.

In another few years, looking 60 — fresh-faced, wrinkle-free, gleaming white teeth or not — may be simply unacceptable. That is the most insidious threat of the rise and rise of cosmetic intervention. Because it carries the implication that being 60 will be equally unacceptable and that you’ve outstayed your welcome and usefulness if you’re still hanging around the workplace and social scene into your seventh decade. Which is alarming considering most of us are going to have to work until we’re 80 because we won’t be able to afford to retire.

So before you cash in your SSIA for a shot of Botox and an extra cup size, consider the long-term implications of your investment. If current fashions continue, at 75 you’ll be working two menial jobs to pay for (a) the surgical treatment to keep you looking 25 and (b) the wages of the carer who helps you into your stairlift at bedtime.

Give the money to charity instead. The resulting beatific glow will match the results of the most expensive laser peel any day.