美英报刊阅读教程Lesson 16 课文

Lesson 16 The Price of Beauty

The government’s sudden decision to ask for a halt to breast-enlargement operations because they might be unsafe has terrified 2m women who have had them. Is America’s obsession with looking good unhealthy?1

1. “Get in shape” orders the cover of the latest issue of Los Angeles magazine. Alongside articles detailing where Madonna works out and recommending “apres-shop spas2” are familiar advertisements offering a quicker route to beauty through “facial sculpture”, liposuction and breast enhancement3. Cosmetic operations, once closely kept secrets, now appear as prizes in southern Californian charity raffles4. Meanwhile morticians complain that silicone implants, which do not burn, are clogging up their crematoriums.5

2. Los Angeles, a desert city which made up for its lack of natural endowments by stealing other people’s water and building its own port, is an appropriate capital for America’s $3 billion cosmetic-surgery industry. Nearly half the world’ s cosmetic surgeons live in America; a third of those work in California. Cosmetic surgery arguably began in San Francisco in 1964 when a topless dancer, Carol Doda, caused a national sensation by increasing her appeal with the help of 20 silicone injections.

3. Until recently the most remarkable thing about cosmetic surgery in America, was how unremarkable it was. There were probably 2m cosmetic “procedures” in 1991-six times the total in 1981. It is no longer news that stars such as Michael Jackson, Liz Taylor and Cher have “gon e under the knife”; one talk-show hostess, Joan Rivers, talks about her body’s ebbs and flows as if they were as natural as the tides.6

4. Now those “effortless’ good looks seem a little more risky. Allegedly, the silicone implants can leak and interfere with the body’s immune system. There have been over 2,000 complaints, particularly about implants which predate 1985-although cosmetic surgeons blame zealous lawyers for manufacturing concerns.7 The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced an inquiry last year, but initially said it would not ask for the operations to stop before it reported. It changed its mind on January 6th, reportedly because of evidence coming out in court cases. In December, for example, a woman who suffered from a ruptured implant8 was awarded $7.34m from the biggest maker of implants, Dow Corning.

5. The announcement has caused more panic among American women than any medical decision since a contraceptive device9, the Dalkon Shield, was removed from the market in 1974. Some 2m women have had implants, 80% of them for cosmetic reasons; the rest had “reconstructive” medical surgery following cancer treatment. The waiting list for implants by one Californian doctor used to be six months; it is now less than one month. Shares in implant makers have slumped.10

6. Such second thoughts are overdue.” For all its glittering advocates, cosmetic surgery is the only type of medicine where a perfectly healthy patient is cut up. (This, of course, omits reconstructive operations to repair burns or replace missing breasts.) Eight out of ten cosmetic operations are performed outside proper hospitals-some in operating rooms that look more like offices. Warnings of side-effects rarely appear in advertisements; nor do the records of the eager surgeons. Since it is “elective” surgery, not covered by insurance, few of the normal rules apply.

7. Inside the industry rumours of malpractice are rife12. One senior plastic surgeon says that he