When it comes to Sheyla Hershey’s breast augmentation and those record-setting gallon-filled breast implants, there’s no shortage of people who want to be heard. Now that the self-described singer, dancer, actress and model is fighting a potentially deadly staph infection, you can be sure the noise level will only increase and that plastic surgeons will add to it.
Here's the back story in case you somehow escaped reading about this sad tale. In a bid to become the record holder for the world’s largest breasts, the young Brazilian woman has had a series of ever larger breast augmentations. Although she currently resides in Houston, TX, Hershey had most of her breast enlargement procedures performed in Brazil as no U.S. plastic surgeon would be a party to a goal like hers. At their peak, so to speak, her breasts measured cup size M.
As Hershey’s breasts grew with many surgeries over the past several years, the woman’s fans and detractors spoke up in seemingly equal numbers. You can just imagine the comments on her website. (Steel yourself and check out her official site at http://www.sheylahershey.net.) When she developed the staph infection and had more breast surgery, this time to reduce the size of her breasts and clean out infected tissue, followers commented again.
The media has also flocked to interview Hershey and chime in since the story began developing, granting her the widespread attention she apparently wanted above all else. As an aside, if ever there were an occasion to wish the media would simply refrain from exploiting a sensational story, this is it. One has to wonder how many other women may be inspired to mutilate their bodies for the sake of fame.
(Don’t media outlets sometimes agree not to show certain criminals to avoid giving them their 15 minutes of fame? Don’t they see beyond sensationalism in favor of the greater good once in a while?)
Unfortunately, those in the media will not be the only ones jumping on this golden opportunity to speak up. Plastic surgeons will soon flood the Internet with press releases. Some will have a sort of, “Tut, tut, I told her so,” message. Others may be a little more gentle, telling women that even if they don’t go to the extreme Hershey did, they need to change their bodies only in ways that make sense.
Whatever the angle the inevitable press releases take, you can be sure the main goal is not to help women, but to drive search engine traffic to the plastic surgeons’ websites. You can tell by the local search keywords the releases will use: “Manhattan plastic surgeon says…” “Beverly Hills breast augmentation surgeon warns…” (In fact, if you were to watch the elective surgery market carefully, you could even predict which plastic surgeons will dive into the Sheyla Hershey “I told you so” game.)
Certainly, everyone in business needs to promote their product or service. And there’s really nothing wrong with search engine marketing—you really have to do it to get found on the very crowded World Wide Web. It’s just sad that the story of this misguided, unhealthy young woman who’s now fighting a serious infection will be an opportunity plastic surgeons can exploit along with everyone else on that bandwagon. And ironic in view of the fact that one of their fellow surgeons, albeit a Brazilian, made it possible.