Woman without medical licence fined S$10,000 for giving customers fat-melting injections

SINGAPORE — In a bid to earn more money, Cheryl Ng Mui Hong began advertising fat-melting injection services on her Instagram account even though she was not medically trained.

The Singaporean gave the injections to at least seven customers before the authorities received an anonymous complaint about her in July 2020.

On Wednesday (June 22), the 43-year-old was fined S$10,000 after pleading guilty to five counts of committing a rash act that endangered her customers’ safety.

Six similar charges were taken into consideration for sentencing.

The court heard that she was not a registered medical practitioner, and did not have the requisite licence and experience to perform medical procedures.

While working a part-time administration job in March 2020, she came up with the idea to earn more income by providing fat-melting injection services.

She then started the Instagram account, running her business out of her own residence and a room she had rented at a Toa Payoh Central salon. She was also prepared to visit her customers’ homes.

She did not tell the salon owner about what she was doing.

Ng said she had attended a five-day course in Malaysia in 2019 where she learned about such injections. The certification that she claimed she had obtained then is not recognised in Singapore, Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Marcus Foo told the court.

She then procured serum for fat-melting from a Malaysian supplier but did not ascertain if this serum was registered or could be used locally.

She also bought boxes of needles from an online store and was unable to tell if they had been properly sterilised.

DPP Foo told the court that the fat-melting injections contained a “moderate likelihood of bruising and scarring”, which could lead to discomfort and haemorrhaging if not dealt with properly. The serum that she used also contained risks of allergic reactions.

According to Ng, she intended to stop providing the injections by August 2020 because she was afraid something might go wrong.

One customer, a 27-year-old woman, paid S$550 for two sessions of injections after coming across Ng’s Instagram account.

Ng injected a red solution and another transparent solution into the customer’s upper arms and upper thighs at multiple spots. This lasted for about one-and-a-half hours.

Other customers paid similar prices. A 33-year-old woman paid S$180 to get fat-melting injections on her face and upper arms.

DPP Foo asked for a S$12,000 fine, noting that her operation was not small and that she did not stop her business even though she knew her actions were wrong.

Ng could have been jailed for up to six months or fined up to S$2,500, or given both punishments, for each offence of committing a rash act that endangered the personal safety of others.