Counterfeit Injections Can Lead to Disfigurement and Death

X-ray of silicone that migrated to patient's lungs after receiving illegal silicone injections

A new documentary by La La Anthony called “Killer Curves: Bodies to Die For” premiered on BET on August 8, 2018. The documentary reports on four women who suffered after receiving illegal butt injections.

BET reports that years after Apryl Michelle Brown, a motivational speaker, received her shots she was hospitalized and expected to die. Two months later, Brown woke from a coma to find all four of her limbs suffering from necrosis and requiring partial amputations. BET reports that another victim, K. Michelle, a recording artist, said she felt great initially but then, “headaches all the time. I couldn't even walk." Her doctor linked her infertility to complications from the silicone butt injections she received.

One of Anivia Cruz’s buttocks ruptured after her illegal injections. She and fellow victim Sidney Star now hold interventions on women to prevent “pump parties,” where multiple women gather to receive injections simultaneously. During an intervention recorded for the documentary, Cruz shared that she spent $2 million on uninsured surgeries to repair the damage done by illegal silicone butt injections. She showed pictures of her damaged body. Some participants had a hard time looking at them.

It is never safe and it is never legal to inject liquid silicone into someone for body contouring purposes. Once liquid silicone is injected into the human body, possible complications include pulmonary embolism, kidney failure, infection, nerve damage, chest pain and breathing problems due to the silicone moving to other parts of a person’s body, and death. The complications can happen immediately, or they can happen years later.