No doubt many of you have seen this week’s main news story relating to the 40,000 UK women with breast implants filled with a type of industrial-grade silicon used to fill mattresses.
The implants in question were manufactured by Poly Implants Protheses (PIP), a French company and were sold to clinics around the world, allegedly at a fraction of the cost of the medical-grade silicon filled implants.
Were the managers and surgeons of the private/public clinics where the procedures were carried-out, too blinkered by pound notes to implement the necessary checks to ensure that the implants were medically safe? And, why did the BMA and the medical regulators allow this to happen?
In my personal opinion, successive UK administrations have spent too much time and money on ridiculous legislation and regulations while failing to address serious issues like the current breast implant scandal.
A case in point – the legislation, introduced in August 2010 forcing retailers to ask for ID from people buying Christmas crackers, classifying them as a category 1 firework meaning there is an age restriction of 16 and cashiers are required to check the age of those buying them. Stores face financial penalties and individual cashiers can face fines of up to £5,000 and six months in prison for selling crackers to underage customers.
We can send a cashier to prison for six months for selling crackers to a minor, but we can’t prevent 40,000 women from living with potential ticking bombs in their chests.
Utter madness! >
