Women are sounding the alarm about rapper Cardi B’s once-loved dangerous ‘bum shots’, which some say have left them with a rotten bottom.
Injectable biopolymers, a natural alternative to plastic, aim to give the patient a curvier, perkier butt without the stresses of surgery.
And celebrities like Cardi B, Love & Hip Hop Atlanta star K. Michelle, and Blac Chyna have received them at some point.
The types of fillers used to create the imitation BBL look are FDA-approved, but only for the face, and using them in the buttocks puts people at risk for side effects that the developers of the injectables never tested for.
Now, a growing number of women are having the plastic-like substance removed after serious adverse reactions, including rotting tissue.
Helen Arias thought they were injecting her with vitamins to give her legs more curves. Years later, he discovered that it was biopolymers that were causing his skin to die. Photo courtesy of Mrs. Arias
Mrs. Arias had to have biopolymers surgically removed from her legs. He was able to see a famous Miami surgeon for free. Photo courtesy of Mrs. Arias
Helen Arias, 44, had been inundated with advertisements for a new type of vitamin injection that claimed to increase fullness in her thighs and buttocks.
The mother of two had always been slimmer and thought the injections would give her lower half a curvier appearance.
She visited a clinic in Florida that advertised the injections, but although she thought she was receiving vitamins, she was actually injected with biopolymers.
Ms Arias said: “I thought it would give me confidence, so I took three shots in each leg.”
“Everything was fine and I started exercising and I noticed my legs were getting bigger.”
But a year after receiving the injections, he noticed discoloration where they had been administered.
She monitored the spots for years, but did not consult a doctor, even though they gradually worsened.
Mrs Arias said: ‘This made my leg turn black. It was necrosis: it looked like rotten flesh and there were lumps everywhere.
“I was looking for answers for years and then at a clinic I went to they told me I had biopolymers, not vitamins.”
His pain was unbearable. A light knock on the coffee table would make her cry. She couldn’t play with her children and even had to tell them not to touch her due to the agonizing discomfort.
Surgery to remove biopolymers from Mrs. Arias’ legs left her with a huge scar. Photo provided by Mrs. Arias
Arias said he met with Miami-based plastic surgeon Dr. Narayanan Nair, who had not injected the biopolymers years before. The doctor agreed to remove, free of charge, the small polymer balls that accumulated in his lower half.
Arias said Dr. Nair saved his life.
She said: ‘I had surgery last year and they took out pretty much all the biopolymers in my leg.
‘Now that I have it out of my body, I feel better. The discoloration has disappeared and I’m starting to put my life back together.’
Meanwhile, Rosangela Dubraska, 48, from Utah, visited a clinic in Venezuela to knowingly receive biopolymer injections in 2008. She was looking for a confidence boost after the changes her body had undergone during her second pregnancy.
She said: ‘The girls at my gym had had biopolymer injections and they looked great. So I did it.’
For about 10 years everything was fine. She was happy with the results and stayed healthy.
But around 2018, his skin began to change color, turning from red to purple. Her hands became swollen, she suffered headaches and twinges in her pelvis and leg, and she could not sit for long due to back pain.
Mrs Dubraska said: “It got so bad I had insomnia and the only thing that cured the pain was morphine.” I asked the doctors for help but they couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me.’
Rosangela Dubraska underwent injections to enhance her butt after her second pregnancy in 2008 and was happy with the results for about 10 years. Then, she noticed discoloration around her butt and began experiencing severe pain. Photo courtesy of Ms. Dubraska
Ms. Dubraska, shown here, had her biopolymers surgically removed and is now completely pain-free. Photo courtesy of Ms. Dubraska
Mrs. Dubraska also saw Dr. Nair to remedy her extreme pain.
Just as he did with Ms. Arias, Dr. Nair performed an MRI and found multiple beads embedded in the tissue of her buttock, causing damage there.
She said: “Dr Nair confirmed that the biopolymers had spread through my body and were causing my pain.”
Dr. Nair performed surgery to remove the small biopolymer balls in February 2024, and her pain and discoloration have since disappeared.
The effects of biopolymers can extend beyond the original injection site and migrate under sitting, exercise, and gravity, which can cause the material to spread to the hips, legs, thighs, and lower back.
The lymphatic system can also transport biopolymers to other parts of the body, which can lead to inflammation and lump formation in other areas of the body.
This can cause widespread tissue damage, nerve damage, breathing problems, and organ failure.
Rosangela, for example, experienced pain and swelling in her hands and lower back.
The severe reactions both women suffered were caused by an inadequate supply of oxygen-rich blood reaching the tissues of the butt and legs, causing tissue death.
When biopolymers are injected into tissues, they can compress blood vessels, reducing blood flow to the affected area. An insufficient blood supply deprives tissues of oxygen and nutrients, causing necrosis.
Necrosis can cause serious inflammation in other parts of the body as the immune system becomes overloaded trying to fight off infections. In most circumstances, this can lead to fever and sepsis, a fatal condition in which the immune system launches a full-scale attack on the body itself while it fights a bacterial infection.
Sepsis can cause organ failure, memory problems, delirium, muscle weakness, tissue death, skin infections and, in one in five people, death.
Cardi b said: ‘In August I had surgery and they removed 95% of my biopolymers… if you don’t know what it is, they are injections**. “It was a really crazy process,” he said in an Instagram Live video this month. Photo courtesy of his Instagram profile.
Rapper Cardi B first spoke out in 2022 about the biopolymers she had injected into her buttocks in 2014, but later admitted that about 95 percent of them had been removed.
She used her experience to give a warning to her fans looking to perk up their butts.
She said: ‘It was a really crazy process. All I’m going to say is if you’re young, if you’re 19, 20, 21, and sometimes you’re too skinny and you’re like, “(OMG) I don’t have enough fat to get up my ass,” so ( resort) to injections in the ass, don’t do it!
In 2018, she revealed that she had received illegal silicone (not biopolymer) injections in her butt in a basement in Queens, New York, at a discounted cost of $800.
The actual number of people opting for filler is unclear, but is likely lower than the approximately 821,000 augmentation procedures with implants and fat grafts performed in 2022.
Cardi B said: “It was the craziest pain ever.” I felt like I was going to faint. I felt a little dizzy. And it drips for about five days.