Hopefully you’ve all seen this story: a new study found that women who have implants have a higher chance of committing suicide (but a lower chance of getting cancer) compared to women who havent had breast augmentation (or whatever euphemism you want to use).

You can find other news stories in other publications, but most stories that I saw on the net failed to explain how breast implants could actually lead to a lower rate of deaths from cancer. This article is careful to add:

According to the researchers, this lower mortality rate is not the result of breast augmentation, but rather of bias in the type of women electing to have surgery. “First, a woman must be in relatively good health to undergo breast implant surgery…Also, women who receive breast implants tend to be of higher-than-average socioeconomic status. Thus, women who undergo breast augmentation surgery are more likely to be in better health than the general population.”

The fact that women with breast implants have higher rates of suicide may not be due to the effects of the implants themselves. It may be because women who want to have their bodies carved and sculpted by surgeons are more unhappy with themselves and with life in general.

But if you arent intuitively suspicious that stuffing bags of liquid plastic under your nipples isnt a good idea, you should be aware of the health risks as well as the advertising and public relations campaigns that have tried to make breast implants more appealing to the public.