Botox, The New WMD

When it comes to beauty, some people don't mind taking risks when they'd be cautious otherwise. It just might be all the unnatural, photoshopped perfection getting to us.

Late last year, my mom's "facialist"—Faith He from China who opened her own relatively successful salon in Seattle about nine years ago—was indicted by a Federal Grand Jury for injecting women with fake cosmetic procedures products. As in fake botox, restylane, etc. And she wasn't licensed to do so with the real stuff either.

Apparently an acquaintance of my mom's was getting (re?)married and wanted everything done. And when a laser-peel wasn't doing the trick, she wanted more. And of course, the facialist obliged. (Might be a Chinese reflex—go to Asia and you'll find people will tell you they can do anything you ask for. Whether they can is a risk you are taking, as I found when the broken watch I took in for repairs was even more broken, or when my resulting perm more closely resembled the sheep outside than the model in the picture I brought).

Anyhow, it turns out the products the facialist was using (may or may not be to her knowledge) was unregulated, fake stuff from China, as this woman found out when it coagulated above her cheekbone and a dermatologist sucked some out for inspection.

Ah China, always churning out the most interesting things. But it gets even more interesting, when the WaPo came out saying how the black market for Botox may be more dangerous than suburban housewives getting lumpy cheekbones.

According to WaPo, the essential ingredient in Botox—botulinum toxin Type A—is the most toxic substance known to man. It just might be the new weapon of mass destruction of choice. A grain-sized amount could kill a 150-lb adult, apparently. But a terrorist would have to get hundreds of vials of Botox ($470 a pop) to kill one person. The only reason why we're still pondering anthrax and uranium is that botulinum's quite allergic to heat, degrading the moment the temperature goes up.

This black market, however, poses a new threat. Especially when you consider this:

James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, two scientists found that a biologist with a master's degree and $2,000 worth of equipment could easily make a gram of pure toxin, an amount equal to the weight of a small paper clip but enough, in theory, to kill thousands of people.

Thankfully so far it seems the only people the stuff goes to are youth-seeking types, but obviously unregulated or no, the products can be made with the real stuff. Then we've got more than lumpy cheeks to worry about.