The car point is interesting - I bought a new rover 2 weeks before they went bust, so all the warranty became invalid not unlike these poor ladies who have a potential time bomb in their chest. It is not just the manufacturer who has gone bust but also the clinic who performend the surgery.

I would have thought all concerns would have insurance to cover this stuff, the problem will be getting insurance to coff up and the opportunity cost of having personnel and facilities tied up doing this remedial work.

I want to be quite clear – I think that the private companies are using excuses to save themselves accepting financial responsibility for their role in the situation. I don't think they should be allowed to do that.

However, as I have also tried to make clear, removal is not just a matter of cosmetic choice, but may well be of medical need.

Such payments do happen in a number of situations, though – such as the compensation to victims of crime that is paid by the state.



So into which category does what Cod'ead described Emma as undergoing fall?



Health would appear to be at risk.

I would add, since we seem to have a large number of male posters here condemning women for "vanity": are you all saying that there are absolutely no pressures on women to conform to certain physical types and that it's a totall level playing field (if you will) as to social and cultural pressure on women?

Normally you would expect the clients/patients to go to the nhs or private medical group that "fitted" the implants and demand corrective surgery. The nhs/private medical group would then seek compensation from the suppliers of the implants. However the suppliers, PIP, appear to have gone broke. The question then is why aren't the private medical groups adequately insured for that eventuality?

The chairman of the Harley Medical Group was pushing the "its the governments fault, they licensed the implants" argument yesterday and insisting they didnt have the resources to carry out 13,000 corrective operations. But if they cant get the government to accept that argument and they dont undertake the corrective operations, why would anyone ever use their services again? Surely they'll go broke if they dont make sure that their clients/patients are properly looked after? Or is just that cosmetic surgery is one of those businesses that are easy to close down and then start up again iunder a different name?

Rock God X wrote:I think the argument of the private companies is that the government licensed the implants for use, so they had every right to assume they were safe. If they're not, the government should sort it. I can see their point to some extent, but I also think that the fact that they acted in good faith shouldn't necessarily free them of any obligation to the patient. Good faith? I would presume that private providers used that supplier, and continued to use it, because they were cut-price. I have no idea as to how much of a saving each made per implant, but wonder whether the saving was passed on to the customer. Big providers were Transform, and Harley medical group. HMG (for example) say that PIP implants were "not the cheapest on the market" but do not explain why they chose them. Were the implants charged out to the customer at cost price? Or did clinics make extra profits? More to the point, did any clinic say to their customers "Although we will be fitting you with PIP implants, please note that as these are approved by the MHRA, we accept NO responsibility whatsoever for them. We are charging you £X for them, true, and we ARE making an extra £Y profit be reselling them to you, true, but if they turn out to be actually substandard hazardous crap, you'll have to sue the government, as we don't see why we should bear any responsibility whatsoever for the implants that we have chosen to use and have advised you to let us insert into your body as perfectly safe. We get them from this guy in France, who sells them much cheaper than average, but we don't need to ask any questions, as he's got his licence so that will do for us.." I don't believe they did. In fact, I have no reason to disbelieve THIS LADY, who in October 2009 posted on a forum what appears to me to be dynamite. One thing which immediately stands out is that, far from any disclaimers, her PIP implants "came with a 10 year guarantee". So that's all right, then.

Rock God X wrote:I think the argument of the private companies is that the government licensed the implants for use, so they had every right to assume they were safe. If they're not, the government should sort it. I can see their point to some extent, but I also think that the fact that they acted in good faith shouldn't necessarily free them of any obligation to the patient. Good faith? I would presume that private providers used that supplier, and continued to use it, because they were cut-price. I have no idea as to how much of a saving each made per implant, but wonder whether the saving was passed on to the customer. Big providers were Transform, and Harley medical group. HMG (for example) say that PIP implants were "not the cheapest on the market" but do not explain why they chose them. Were the implants charged out to the customer at cost price? Or did clinics make extra profits? More to the point, did any clinic say to their customers "Although we will be fitting you with PIP implants, please note that as these are approved by the MHRA, we accept NO responsibility whatsoever for them. We are charging you £X for them, true, and we ARE making an extra £Y profit be reselling them to you, true, but if they turn out to be actually substandard hazardous crap, you'll have to sue the government, as we don't see why we should bear any responsibility whatsoever for the implants that we have chosen to use and have advised you to let us insert into your body as perfectly safe. We get them from this guy in France, who sells them much cheaper than average, but we don't need to ask any questions, as he's got his licence so that will do for us.." I don't believe they did. In fact, I have no reason to disbelieve THIS LADY, who in October 2009 posted on a forum what appears to me to be dynamite. One thing which immediately stands out is that, far from any disclaimers, her PIP implants "came with a 10 year guarantee". So that's all right, then.

I'd say that men are under similar pressures these days as well.

I think there is a distinction to be made, though, between a woman who has had augmentation surgery because the size of her breasts was causing her psychological trauma, and a woman who 'just wanted to be bigger'. That's not to say that they shouldn't both be entitled to the same recourse when it goes wrong, however.

I think the pressure on men and boys is increasing massively these days – not least as companies see a big, and relatively untapped, market.



No disagreement with this.

If only all contracts were written in such a way.

It's a watershed moment for the cosmetic surgery industry. They need to sort this and quickly, those who don't will be (rightly) screwed.

Providers who are saying they will charge are bandying about figures of around £3K per op. IF that is supposed to be 'cost price' (and I have no idea if it is) then that means the cost of 13,000 is approx. £40m. That would make a hole in anyone's accounts. What i would say though is that they presumably did NOT charge these 'low' prices to insert the implants in the first place, and so have already collected substantially more than that from the patients.

There are troubling aspects which are easy to find on the web. There seems to have been much noise about PIP implants for a long time, and the US never authorised them at all. Was there an element of ignoring the warning flags and just ploughing on blindly, hiding behind the 'approval' shield? Looks like it to me.

As for who pays - well,

(a) obviously every clinic should be insured, so cost to them should not even come into it. I suspect the difference is between volunteering to do a replacement directly; and a customer going via lawyers with a formal claim. The latter would be passed straight on to the clinic's insurers, whereas the former would be the clinic choosing to pay out of its own pocket. Thank heaven for claimant lawyers and (while they last) no win no fee agreements. These will empower the women concerned to get justice.

(b) the manufacturer may have gone bust, but surely it must have been someone's job to check whether such a supplier was properly insured, and that, year on year, this insurance remained adequate and in force? Or did the clinics never bother checking whether major suppliers carried insurance cover? If so, they are fools and richly deserve to be sued and made to pay.

I don't know if you're implying that I did or not, but I'm not saying any of it is 'all right'. And I have stated quite clearly that I think the private clinics should pay for any corrective surgery.

But aren't these things just a depressing indictment of our 'compensation culture'?