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Cosmetic surgery in the United Kingdom is a growing market, and behaves like the market for any other consumer good. A growth in demand (fuelled by coverage of celebrities in the media) leads to a competitive increase in supply, leading in turn to lower prices. What was once the preserve of the rich few is now affordable to many.
Every consumer magazine from Woman's Own to Hello! gives advice on how to improve one's appearance and stay young. Direct advertising of cosmetic surgery is a tiny, albeit important, aspect of this culture, and it is misguided to think that banning it will reduce demand.
The functions of advertising in this, as in any free market, are to inform and persuade. Restriction of information can lead to monopolies that deform the market, acting against the public interest. It would be regressive to back an advertising ban in this multimillion pound industry.
The Independent Healthcare Advisory Services (IHAS) is a trade body of which all major independent acute healthcare providers in the United Kingdom are members. The IHAS believes that advertising of members' services is a legitimate and reasonable business practice, and that a general restriction would not be in the public interest. However, advertising in healthcare, as in any other sector, must not lead to public harm. Some invasive procedures included in our members' repertoires contain such inherent risk to a patient that restraint must be applied in advertising them. This is why IHAS members have established and follow a code of practice for the advertising of their services that is designed to avoid harm to the public.
Cosmetic surgery and injectible procedures are not clinically indicated and have risks attached. The UK government holds that it...