Irish firemen and cosmetic surgery

The next time you happen to put the chimney on fire and your sister, mother – or worse, girlfriend or wife – admires the chiselled, sooty, smoky handsomeness of the fireman who rides to the rescue, you can snicker away to yourself in the knowledge that the object of their admiration is probably not real.

That’s because a growing number of Irishmen are booking themselves in for a spot of work on their nose, chin, pecs, abs or possibly even nether regions – and firemen are among those who are most enthusiastic about someone cosmetic work.

The Sunday Independent reports that “well-known personalities, fitness trainers and firemen” are some of those to have booked themselves into the Cosmedico Clinic in Co Wicklow.

Well-known personalities and fitness trainers we would expect – vanity is a given there, right? – but the presence of Irish damsel-in-distress-saving boyos on the list is something that raised our eyebrows.

Cosmedico conducts about 30 facelifts a month, with almost half of those now carried out on men.

Managing Director Ailish Kelly told the paper, “Facelifts are becoming more and more popular with men. We have a 40/60 split with men and women having facelifts. A lot of these men are separated men who are back on the scene or men who have lost their jobs. That is probably linking in with the climate we are in, in that they just want to look better.

“They are in competition with younger, better-looking guys and they don’t want to look old, and they don’t want to look tired … [The number of Irish men attending the clinic] has definitely doubled over the past year. Even since June of this year, the increase in males has been huge.”