More than 3,500 women who attended private clinics to be given breast implants made by a scandal-hit French company have been formally referred to the NHS, government figures show.
Statistics released by the Department of Health (DoH) on Friday indicate that 3,512 women – 553 in the last week alone – have been referred to the NHS for care following the global scare surrounding Poly Implant Prothèse (PIP) silicone implants.
The DoH said that, two months after the scandal first broke in France, more than 1,400 scans had been completed and that, of those women scanned, 120 would be having their implants removed. Sixteen had already had implants removed, it added.
The government has said it will provide free care for any of the estimated 40,000 women fitted with the PIP implants, which were found to contain cheap, non-medical silicone. It said it intended to recover costs from the private clinics concerned.
The women who had initially gone private but were now coming to the NHS for scans and potential implant removals had been clients of a number of clinics including the Harley Medical Group and the cosmetic surgery provider Transform, the DoH said.
Transform initially refused to pay for removals before performing a u-turn and saying that any patient who received PIP implants could have free scans and the offer of removal, although replacement could cost £2,500.
The Harley Medical Group, which fitted almost 14,000 British women with the implants, also initially refused to foot the bill. It subsequently said it would remove implants from those who underwent operations in the last 10 years, but only if they had suffered a rupture and had a scan as proof.
If implants were put in within the last six years, patients will be eligible for a replacement and, between six and 10 years, will be charged cost price to replace the implants.
According to the latest figures, an estimated 747 women are believed to have PIP implants provided by the NHS, but only 10 have received scans so far. Thirty-three have decided to have the implants removed, and four have already done so.
