The medical establishment has misread the data.
Breast implants are still dirty.
In 1992, safety concerns led the Food and Drug Administration to set severe restrictions on the use of silicone gel implants. The implant debacle looked like a clear victory for tens of thousands of female Davids over a corporate Goliath. Then suddenly, the media pendulum swung the other way, depicting implants and their makers as the unfortunate victims of greedy women and attack-dog lawyers. A 1994 study published in the NEJM by researchers at the Mayo Clinic compared the medical records of 1,498 women without implants residing in Olmsted County, Minnesota, where Mayo is located, with those of 749 age-matched women who'd received implants at the clinic from 1964 through 1991. She subsequently became the chief apologist for implants.