Plastic surgery gets boost in Brazil .
Simona de Logu
RIO DE JANEIRO 1996-12-06
Plastic surgery is booming , especially among men , as Brazilians spend much of their new-found wealth on the latest beauty treatments , said the organisers of a four-day international plastic surgery conference that opened on Friday .
The number of plastic surgeries in Brazil has jumped 30 percent to an estimated 150,000 this year since an anti-inflation plan was introduced in July 1994 , Farid Hakme , the president of the Brazilian Plastic Surgery Society ( SBCP ) , said .
The number of operations on men increased even more -- by 80 percent , from 8,000 in 1994 to 15,000 in 1995 , he said .
" Brazil ranks right at the top for plastic surgery with respect to the number of surgeons , the number of patients , number of operations , number of conferences .
Our statistics are the highest for everything , " Hakme said .
" We believe the increase in plastic surgeries for men results from the difficulties in the job market .
People need to have a more youthful look to compete in the job market , given the profound changes in Latin America 's economy . "
A controlled exchange rate , trade liberalisation and tight monetary policies have also dramatically curbed inflation , making more money available for cosmetic surgery .
Brazil has been at the forefront in plastic surgery for decades and is home to one of the most famous surgeons , Ivo Pitangy .
There are 6,000 plastic surgeons there , of which 4,500 have qualified to be members of the SBCP .
Every year , 500 new plastic surgeons graduate in Brazil and medical students from all over the world come to study there .
Hakme attributes Brazil 's fascination with plastic surgery not to excessive vanity but to the country 's mix and match of different races , which can create physical disharmonies . "
What happens is the nose sometimes does n't match the mouth or the buttocks do n't match with the legs , " he said .
Brazil 's most sought-after beauty treatment is liposuction in which fat is sucked away from areas of the body , with about 30,000 operations a year at a cost of $ 3,000 to $ 4,000 each .
Stomach tucks and breast operations are also popular since the tropical climate calls for flesh-baring fashions , but unlike women elsewhere Brazilians tend to have breast reductions and buttock implants .
" The women who want to reduce their breasts here would probably want to increase them in the United States , " SBCP Vice-President Oswaldo Saldanha said . "
Beauty ideals and cultures are different in every country . "
Plastic surgery scares like the case in which Brazilian model Claudia Liz fell into a coma after being anaesthetised for a liposuction in October are not much of a deterrent .
Saldanha said operations fell 30 percent immediately after that case but the rate was back to normal now .