Friday, January 12, 2007

Always Look for "100% Natural"

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer (or as James Taranto likes to say "Intelligent as a Post") has run an editorial bemoaning the (re-)approval of silicone breast implants.

We've never had much faith in the FDA, but its approval of silicone gel-filled breast implants marks an all-time low for the agency.

Restricted since 1992, the implants were deemed unsafe because of the health risks associated with them, such as cancer. The FDA currently recommends that only women over the age of 22 get the implants. It also asks the makers of the implants (which can rupture during a mammogram), Allergan Corp. and Mentor Corp., to carry out a 10-year, 80,000-patient study in order to "fully answer important questions" regarding the products safety. Say what? The approval of the implants is completely backasswards. Clearly, (lobbying) money talks, and in this case, it jiggles for a few years before it hardens and leaks toxins into your lymph nodes, joints, uterus and liver.

Roughly 5 percent of U.S. women likely will get the implants in the next decade.

I wonder where they got their statistics. Five percent of American women will get silicone implants in the next decade? Really? 7.5 million women want these implants?

Brown University did a study of 1998 medical procedures that said there were about 132,000 breast augmentation operations done that year. But those were crappy saline implants. Not the
real thing like you can get anywhere else in the world. Now, demand is going to go up by a factor
of five.

Well, you naysayers, just remember to keep your hands (pun intended) and laws of their bodies! Instead, if you want to discourage this sort of behavior, I suggest shaming them. How about T-Shirts emblazoned with -

100% Organic

100% Natural

0% Artificial Additives

No comments: