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Stature of Limitations in China In a newly competitive society, being short can mean being passed over. T o some people, the answer lies in a painful surgery that adds inches. By Ching-Ching Ni Times Staff Writer Posted March 31 2005 BEIJING She's an acting student. Each of them willingly had a doctor break their legs and insert steel pin s into the bones just below their knees and above their ankles. The pins are attached to a bulky contraption that looks like a metal cage. For s ix months or so, they will wear this stretching device even though it de livers excruciating pain eased only by medication.
Click Here advertisement They dial the adjustment knobs daily, forcing the ends of the broken limb s to pull away from each other even as they heal. As new bone grows, the device forces it apart again, resulting in more new bone to fill the ga p Patients on the device typically gain about 3 inches in six months. It may sound like medieval torture, but people who are determined to stan d taller say it's nothing short of a dream maker. At about $6,000, the treatment is out of reach for the average Chinese ur banite, who makes just more than $1,100 a year. But for some with money, it's a price they're willing to pay. In this increasingly competitive s ociety, height has emerged as one of the most visible criteria for upwar d mobility. "I was not tall enough to apply to film school before," said the 20-year- old acting student, who was accepted to the Beijing Film Academy after a dding 3 inches to her 5-foot-1-inch frame. The school's website says fem ale acting department applicants must be at least 5 feet 3 "I'm taking a year off from school to do this," said the 22-year-old busi ness major, who at 5 feet 4 worried that his height would keep him from getting coveted white-collar jobs. Like most who undergo the procedure, the students asked not to be ident ified, for reasons of self-consciousness. Deng Xiaoping was on e of the giants of the country's modern history even though he stood onl y about 5 feet tall. But then came the market-oriented reforms of the 1980s, and Chinese began to face an explosion of lifestyle choices. Cosmetic surgery and other a ppearance-related industries became big business. These days, China is inundated with images of long-legged success stories . From fashion magazines to billboards to TV shows, young people look up to icons such as Lu Yan, an international supermodel who stands 5 feet 10, and NBA star Yao Ming, who at 7 feet 6 is trumpeted as the walking G reat Wall of China. To help produce a taller nation, Beijing has been advocating more milk co nsumption for school-age children. The average Chinese woman is about 5 feet 2, the average man about 5-6. Partly the result of improved nutriti on and living standards, they're about 08 inch taller than a decade ago , making the Chinese among the fastest-growing people in the world. The country's obsession with height has created a market for such items a s calcium supplements, herbal tonics and special shoes with massaging so les. The latest exercise machines sold here are said to feature infrared energy to stimulate growth hormones. Now leg extensions have taken the beauty business to new heights. "Before the economic reforms that changed China, we weren't getting enoug h food to eat, so we paid little attention to how we looked," said Zhang Chunjiang, a spokesperson at a height consulting business in Beijing. " Today we have enough to eat and we care a lot about how we look." Using surgery to boost the height of otherwise healthy people is a relati vely new concept. The technology is based on the work of a Russian docto r and was originally intended to correct uneven limbs. The surgery is of fered in about a dozen countries, including the United States. Most doct ors outside China are reluctant to do it for purely cosmetic reasons. "We do more leg lengthening than any other place in the world, but only 5 % of that is for cosmetic purposes," said Dr. Dror Paley, a director of the International Center for Limb Lengthening in Baltimore, which has pe rformed about 8,000 leg-lengthening procedures since 1987. Most of the s urgeries are performed on patients who suffer from birth defects or trau ma, Paley said, adding that he requires lengthy psychological evaluation s before he will do the procedure for cosmetic reasons. "Unlike most plastic surgeries, the risks here are huge," he said. In China, apparently, an increasing number of people think it's worth the risk. In the old days, when the government handed out the most desirable jobs, many college-educated Chinese didn't have to worry about finding work on their own. But now the job market is a seller's market, and seemingly i rrelevant factors such as height play a role in who is hired. "In China, the competition for jobs is too fierce," said Xia Hetao, one o f a handful of physicians in the country who specializes in leg lengthen ing. "All else being equal, height becomes a deciding factor." Many empl oyers list height requirements in their job descriptions. A garment manufacturer was looking for a female secretary for its Beijing office recently. At the top of the list of requirements was age betwe en 25 and 40 and height at least 5 feet 4 An ad for the restaurant chain TGI Friday's was more lenient: women above 5 feet 1 and men above 5 feet 4 Would-be drivers must also pass a height test. According to the website o f the Beijing Public Security Bureau of Traffic Administration, applican ts must be at least 5 feet 1 to drive a car and 5 feet 4 to drive a truc k or bus. Though many educational institutions are trying to increase enrollment an d no longer have height requirements, others such as the Beijing Film Ac ademy's acting department continue to seek candidates of a certain statu re. At the Foreign Ministry, it's common knowledge that most candidates must meet an informal height standard, an official there said. "If you are very short or have some other defects on your face, for example, it could affect the govern ment's image." In one case, a wo man sued after she was turned down for a government job in the southern city of Shenzhen because of her height. The suit was tossed out last yea r by the court, which said it didn't have the power to control the inter nal practices of the government agency. "The law says everyone has the right to work, but society has to set some limits because our resources are too limited," said Sun Dongdong, a law professor at Peking University. If an employer has only one opening and many candidates, he h as the right to hire who he thinks is the most appropriate." Such benefits of height aside, those contemplating leg lengthening have r eason to think twice. State media haven't been shy about reporting on bo tched operations. Some of those who have undergone the procedure have suffered nerve or tis sue damage, infection or improper healing of the bone, leaving them unab le to walk or even stand. If done properly, however, the procedure should have a very low failure r ate, said Xia, the physician. He said he had performed more than 1,400 o f the operations since 1996, usually between 100 and 180 a year. Only ab out eight patients didn't recover fully, he said. Zhang Wanzhong, a surgeon in the eastern city of Hangzhou, said he had pe rformed more than 2,000 of the procedures, accounting for about 10% of h is orthopedic business. "But some insist th ey suffer from so much discrimination they feel insecure, depressed, eve n suicidal. Xia recalls a patient who was shorter than his girlfriend. Her parents sa id they would rather die than see the couple wed. The suitor checked int o Xia's clinic, and once he became taller than his girlfriend, they marr ied. Xia's oldest patient was a 52-year-old retired engineer who enjoyed ballr oom dancing but was so petite she couldn't find a suitable partner. I say they are rea l patients and they really do suffer," Xia said. Most patients undergo the operation in secret and spend their "growing" t ime in the privacy of a hospital or at home. While in pain, they say, th ey try to concentrate on the results. "I can't wait to buy all new clothe...
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