Fish pedicure spas hurt by reports
Tuesday 25th October 2011, 8:00PM BST.
Spas offering fish pedicures in the Black Country today faced an uncertain future after questions were raised over the safety of the treatment.
Bosses at Tootsies in Walsall fear they could be forced to close by Christmas after the number of customers dropped from 40 a day to just eight, with health warnings appearings in the media.
It’s feared the treatment – which sees fish nibble away dead skin – can cause infections in people with sores or cuts to their feet.
Sharon O’Mara, who manages Tootsies in the Saddlers Centre, Walsall, has seen the number of customers drop from 40 on a normal Saturday to eight last week.
She said: “The story had a major effect on us, there’s just nobody coming in any more besides our regulars. People walk past and shout that we are infectious. It’s not nice.”
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This is an awful fad that deserves to fail, dirty people putting feet in with live fish and then in same water the next dirty set of feet are put.
Just worry that all these fish will end up in our waterways when these businesses fail and close.
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As with many ‘health and safety’ scares, the feaars have been overblown.
As long as basic precautions are taken, the risk of infection remains minimal.
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You understand that these fish do the exact same thing on the coastlines in the wild? With dirtier feet and dirtier people? You almost sounded as if this is some sort of animal cruelty, but you really can’t argue with nature.
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Read the guidance for yourself and make your own mind up:
http://www.hpa.org.uk/webc/HPAwebFile/HPAweb_C/1317131045549
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Clearly it’s not a case of “Health and Safety” gone mad but a sensationalist press and hysterical public, which I think normally is the case!!
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Excellent news in my opinion, the business came in to the local vicinity… started trading under a name which was already in use by my other half for her mobile foot health service (which qualifications and medical training are both needed for) and we challenged them with all of this regarding hygeine in the first week of them being opened. Environmental health at the time were not concerned either… half a year down the line and now they listen.
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I think that the main point which was missed during this whole ‘health and safety’ scare as people have named it, is that their is no basic qualification required to work in one of these places. Non of the staff are trained foot health specialists, one of my close friends is fully trained & spent years doing so. She is part of the UK board of foot health practicioners which has been campaining to ban the whole thing. Precautions need to be taken for this to be the least bit sanitary & the people doing it are not qualified to take these precautions. I sat & watched 10 people in a row in star city having these treatments & not one of them had thier feet checked before hand.
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Fools and their money are always easily parted!!
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