Plastic surgery is no longer for just people in the showbiz. 

According to newest report on plastic surgery numbers released by the SoYoung.com, China’s largest online database and information center for plastic surgery and aesthetics alteration, China’s plastic surgery market is growing fast.

It has developed six times faster than the global average when it comes to the number of people undergoing treatment. 

Plastic surgeon Yu Haifeng says eyelid alternations, facelift procedure are becoming widely popular and socially acceptable in China. The trend is definitely influenced from neighboring countries such as Japan and South Korea where cosmetic surgery has been common for decades. 

What is interesting is that China’s main demographics seeking treatment are actually born after the year 1990. “People as young as fourteen and as old as sixty are all my clients. What you can see is the number of people seeking treatment is growing as their disposable income grows and the majority seeking alterations are much younger than the west,” said Dr. Yu, he pointed out another interesting phenomenon, which is the treatment seekers come in waves. 

In most western countries, pictures are not included on resume or job applications, but many progressive western firms have even gone to cover up the names of applicants and asked applicants to remove any details that may indicate race, gender or age. 

In a competitive world like this, Laura Fan, a young professional in Beijing, said it is increasingly common amongst her friends to do a double eyelid surgery right out of college.

“I’m not ashamed of it because it is quite common. And it is not a hidden secret, my HR manager has outright spoken about skimming through the stack of resumes and picking out the prettiest candidates first.” said Laura.

The survey from SoYoung shows that 96 percent of cosmetic surgery consumers are under the age of 35, whereas the figure in the US is almost the opposite with 75 percent of cosmetic surgery patients being over the age of 35. 

Laura: “Most of us all graduated from top schools and are well educated. Our skillsets don’t vary drastically so it comes down to who’s more qualified overall, and this includes our looks.”

Though most of the procedures done are categorized as low risk surgeries, there are still the health risks of infection, overdose on injections, scars and the fact that anything done is practically irreversible. Is it right for these young professionals just starting off their adult life to go under the scalpel and the pain in hopes of a better career opportunity?

As these are becoming more and more widely spread and socially acceptable lets examine what the most sought after treatments are and why they are sought after.

The technologies are upgrade and the qualities of surgeons are improving and China’s cosmetic surgery market is growing. 

Staggering figures showed that in every five cosmetic surgery patient there are two that are Chinese. The Whitepaper shows that it expects China to have 14 million Chinese who has gone under the knives, that is a 42 percent year-on-year growth from 2016, significantly higher than the world percentage of 7 percent. 

China has now become the fastest growing market for aesthetics alteration.