6 janvier, 2008 13:31
The cities where vanity is a booming trade
Telegraph.co.uk - United Kingdom
Sorrel Buchanan, 22, from Salisbury, had a tummy tuck and breast implants in October following pregnancy. The single mother said she could afford the £9000 ...
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The cities where vanity is a booming trade
By Laura Donnelly, Health Correspondent
Last Updated: 1:31am GMT 07/01/2008
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A "vanity map" has identified the cathedral city of Salisbury as having more cosmetic surgeons per head of population than any other British city. It has 13.1 surgeons per 100,000 people, five times as many as London and 13 times as many as Glasgow. |
Michael Cadier is a cosmetic surgeon in Salisbury. The small affluent city has the most plastic surgeons per head
Surgeons in the Wiltshire city say they have no shortage of clients, with most of them wealthy women who do not work.
Figures from the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (Baaps) show significant geographical variations in where its members practise.
While large cities have surprisingly few members per head of population, small cities with universities and cathedrals tend to have many more.
Snapping at Salisbury's ankles is Cambridge (with 13 surgeons per 100,000 people), Chester (12.7) and Gloucester (12.2). Glasgow came bottom with just 0.9 per 100,000.
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More than 100,000 aesthetic surgical treatments were carried out in the country as a whole last year - a threefold increase on 2002.
A further 500,000 non-invasive treatments such as Botox were also performed - a 14-fold increase.
Facelifts and breast surgery were the most popular among women, while nose procedures were the most common for men, according to research by the market analyst Mintel.
Michael Cadier, a cosmetic surgeon at the private New Hall Hospital in Salisbury, said: "This is an affluent area, but cosmetic surgery is still seen as a luxury item. People come to us because they have come into some money from an inheritance, or they choose it over a holiday or a car.
"More than half of the patients I see are richer women who don't work, but I also see women who have made their money through successful careers and want to reward themselves, and as well as that, there is a steady trickle of men."
Sorrel Buchanan, 22, from Salisbury, had a tummy tuck and breast implants in October following pregnancy.
The single mother said she could afford the £9,000 double procedure because her parents had benefited from an inheritance.
"I don't know if women in Salisbury are vain, but it is quite affluent, there are some pretty wealthy families here," she added.
"I put on a lot of weight in pregnancy, and it had left my breasts and stomach in a terrible state, so when my parents came into some money it meant I could do something about it."
Surgeons in some smaller cities, including Salisbury, have built up their private surgery work on the back of NHS hospitals which specialise in reconstructive surgery. Surgeons in the NHS split their work between the state and private sectors.
The president of Baaps, Douglas McGeorge, who practises in Chester, said social background, as well as spare disposable income, often contributed to a decision to go under the knife.
"In my experience, new money spends on appearances, and old money doesn't," he said.
"There are certain groups in society, such as footballers' wives, who are more image-conscious, and are more likely to spend their disposable income on their appearances. It isn't necessarily about how much money people have, more about how they choose to spend it."
• One in four women over 50 would consider plastic surgery, a poll has shown. Facelifts, eyelifts and tummy tucks were top of the wish list in the survey of 8,000 people by Saga magazine.
Twenty-six per cent of women aged 50 and over said they might go under the knife, compared with nine per cent of men.
