Court hears breast gel claim (Shenzhen Daily) Updated: 2006-05-24 09:06
A local court yesterday began hearing a claim for compensation for the
effects of a toxic breast-boosting gel ¡ª the first since China banned the
product last month.
The case ¡ª an appeal filed by a woman Zhang Huiqin against an earlier court
ruling ¡ª could be the first of many against the producers of the hydrophilic
polyacrylamide gel, known as PAAG, according to the Hong Kong-based South China
Morning Post.
At least 15 people, most of them from Shenzhen and Hong Kong, met Zhang and
her lawyer Pu Zhiqiang on Monday to discuss a possible class action, the Post
said.
Zhang lodged the suit against a local hospital for irreversible injuries she
said were sustained as a result of injections of the gel she received in 2002 as
part of forehead augmentation surgery. The gel has since moved around her face
and caused her severe pain, she says.
The gel is made by the hospital¡¯s parent company Jilin Fuhua and has been
used in other augmentation procedures such as breast enlargements, the Post
said.
A lower court turned down Zhang¡¯s case for compensation from the hospital,
prompting her to appeal to the Shenzhen Intermediate People¡¯s Court.
¡°I hope this time the court hearing will at least be fair, because the first
trial was a nightmare for me. The court didn¡¯t give me a chance to prove the
injuries were caused by PAAG nor did the judge hear or consider evidence from
both sides,¡± she was quoted by the Post as saying.
Jilin Fuhua successfully sued Zhang for defamation after she complained to
the media and the government about the harm she suffered.
The State Food and Drug Administration pulled the gel from the market April
30 and withdrew Jilin Fuhua¡¯s production license.
The alarm was raised in mid-April by Hong Kong¡¯s Consumer Council, which said
the gel was cancerous and could cause women to lose their breasts.
The production of PAAG was approved on the mainland in
1997.
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