It’s lunchtime and a huge line forms in front of Shanghai’s most popular restaurant, but the crowd is for a clinic for “aesthetic medicine,” a less invasive alternative to surgery that is gaining popularity in China. Lasers, hyaluronic acid injections, peelings… In the age of selfies, faster and less invasive techniques, which do not require going through an operating room, seduce a new generation of Chinese.
Kayla Zhang, 27, doesn’t plan on going through the scalpel. Instead, he paid for laser treatment, injections and placed tension wires under the skin of his face. “I will not change my nose or eyes. It would be an excessive change in my appearance”, explains the young woman, who claims to be looking for a “better version” of herself instead of a “totally new face”.
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Popular in the West, these methods – less invasive and cheaper than cosmetic surgery – are becoming very affordable in Chinese metropolises as the standard of living rises.
According to the Chinese Association of Plastic and Aesthetic Surgery, the industry is expected to reach a turnover of 300 billion yuan ($265 billion) this year, seven times more than in 2013.
Non-invasive techniques represent a very important segment of this trend, while surgery is losing steam, according to the American business consulting firm Frost & Sullivan.
But authorities are trying to prevent the industry from developing in a chaotic way: they ban advertising practices that contribute to “appearance problems” and physical complexes. Specialist clinics cannot present “before and after” photos of an intervention or promote “unrealistic beauty standards”.
In 2021, authorities imposed tens of millions of dollars in fines for various infractions. Li Li, a 27-year-old professional model, receives laser treatments every month to correct blemishes on her skin. But he says he feels social pressure to continually improve his image. After comments from friends about the features of her face, in proportions not ideal for them, she filled her chin with hyaluronic acid. “I was quick to do that,” he explains.
According to the British auditing firm Deloitte, these interventions – which are also temporary – cost an average of one third of the price of cosmetic surgery operations. Specialist doctor Yang Kaiyuan points out that ten years ago, his clients used to show him a picture of a celebrity and say, “I want to look like this”. “Today, people mainly want small improvements in their appearance,” he explains.
However, the increase in the number of unauthorized establishments worries the authorities. In 2019, 15% of the 13,000 authorized beauty clinics worked outside their defined fields of activity, according to a report by Shanghai-based iResearch office.
According to the same study, one in three needles in circulation was not certified. In early 2021, an actress posted on social media images of her nose with a necrotic tip after an operation that went wrong.
But for Ken Huang, president of the PhiSkin clinic in Shanghai, these incidents do not diminish the popularity of cosmetic treatments among young Chinese who want to improve their appearance or increase their opportunities in the job market. “Beautiful people have more opportunities than others,” he says. “If you’re not attractive on the outside, even if you have an interesting personality, people may not have the chance to see you,” he points out.
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