SINGAPORE — A 45-year-old woman was sentenced to 14 weeks’ jail for performing aesthetic services on two customers without a valid licence.

On Wednesday (May 29), Shi Ling, a Singapore permanent resident from China, pleaded guilty to five charges of practising as a medical practitioner without a valid certificate.

Another 10 similar charges were taken into consideration for sentencing.

Shi Ling is the owner and director of One Skin Management, an aesthetic clinic located at Far East Plaza shopping centre in the Orchard Road shopping district.

Court documents showed that she rented a shop space at the second storey of Far East Plaza and operated a beauty salon and spa there sometime around October 2017.

She also rented another unit on the fifth storey to operate a business called “Lolita Prenatal and Postnatal Repair”.

This unit was used to carry out invasive aesthetic procedures on customers.

Between 2016 and July 24 in 2019, Shi Ling carried out various invasive procedures such as botox injections, and used a laser machine to perform skin whitening, pigmentation and acne scar treatments at the Lolita shop or her home. 

In early 2018 and April 2019, she performed threadlift injection procedures on a customer and collected a total of S$6,000 as payment.

Threadlifting is a non-surgical, minimally invasive face-lifting treatment that uses threads made of special material to lift sagging skin and cheeks.

Then, in July 2019, a customer was at the Lolita shop and Shi Ling carried out botox injections under the customer’s eyes.

After that, she took the customer to the One Skin shop on the lower floor where she received S$150 as payment for the procedure.

And in June and July the same year, Shi Ling also did two filler injection treatments on a customer’s chin.

For all of these procedures, she would perform an allergy test on the customer to observe for any allergic reactions before proceeding with the injections.

On March 6 in 2019, a man by the name of David Wong sent an email to the Health Sciences Authority to complain that Shi Ling was doing "forbidden" things that should be done only by a certified plastic surgeon. It was not stated in court documents if there was an outcome to this complaint.

Separately, another complaint was sent to the Ministry of Health (MOH) by a different person who was her customer, saying that Shi Ling was providing aesthetic services.

Following the complaint, MOH sought the opinion of Dr Goh Chee Leok, a senior consultant dermatologist, who said that the conduct of allergy tests constitute a medical diagnostic procedure.

Dr Goh said that such tests, which require proper medical training to do, are sometimes associated with severe adverse reactions that could be acute and life-threatening.

In his letter to MOH, Dr Goh confirmed that by carrying out the botox, filler and threadlift injections, Shi Ling had practised medicine by injecting controlled medication through the skin and into the bodies of her customers.

During investigations, she said that although she had obtained qualifications to provide such services in China, she knew that they were not recognised here in Singapore and that her services were deemed as illegal.

'TRIED TO EVADE DETECTION'

Mr Andre Tan, a prosecuting officer from MOH, sought a jail sentence of between six and eight months, pointing out that Shi Ling was aware that her services were illegal but still proceeded to carry them out.

He added that she had tried to conceal her illegal activities by carrying them out either at her residences or at one of her shops, where business was touted as providing prenatal and postnatal care services.

During mitigation, defence counsel Adrian Tan from August Law Corporation told the court that Shi Ling is pregnant with twins and sought the court’s consideration to impose a non-custodial sentence.

In meting out the sentence, District Judge Koo Zhi Xuan acknowledged that "public interest was clearly harmed" by the illegal provision of medical treatment and procedures, adding that Shi Ling had also tried to evade detection by disguising her shop as one that provides postnatal care.

For each count of her offence, she could have been jailed for up to 12 months or fined up to S$100,000, or both.