The Health Ministry has been urged to impose strict control over the cosmetic surgery industry as there is no specific law to bar those unqualified from performing cosmetic operations.

Consumers Association of Penang (CAP) president SM Mohamed Idris said to date, the ministry could only act under the Private Healthcare Facilities and Services Act 1998 and Medical Act 1971.

“The acts are only applicable against untrained doctors who perform cosmetic surgery. Actually until now, the laws are inadequate to protect consumers from being cheated by unqualified ‘cosmetic surgery specialists’.

“So, CAP wants the government to take immediate action by formulating a special law against those without the necessary credentials to perform cosmetic surgery,” he told a press conference in George Town today.

He said society’s obsession with beauty had resulted in many who were willing to squander thousands of ringgit to go under the knife and become victims of unscrupulous beauty centres.

Mohamed Idris said the lucative profits had prompted the emergence of untrained or inexperienced “back street” medical practitioners performing cosmetic surgery and handling equipment for cosmetic surgery.

He said CAP had received many complaints on cosmetic surgery foul-ups since the 1980s and had forwarded them to the Health Ministry but until today, there was no law on cosmetic surgery to protect consumers.

- Bernama