An Ultimate Sacrifice

The most important issue to note is the serious danger to your health, being or becoming a size zero can do to your body. Following the size zero trend has already claimed the lives of many models on a number of occasions. Between 2006 and 2007, 5 well known and aspiring models died of health complications relating to Anorexia Nervosa.

Luisel Ramos

Luisel Ramos, a Uruguayan model died on August 2, 2006 of heart failure caused by anorexia nervosa. At the age of 22, Luisel had adopted a diet of lettuce and diet coke, which she lived on for 3 months prior to her death. She weighed 44kgs with a height of 5’9”, her BMI was just 14.5. The WHO considers a BMI of 16 to be starvation.

Ana Carolina Reston

In the same year following Luisel’s death, was Ana Carolina Reston, a model from Brazil, who was just 21 when she died of the disease in 2006. It was reported that Ana had been living on a diet of apples and tomatoes. At the time of her death, with a height of 5’8” she weighed a mere 40kg. Ana was even more extremely malnourished than Luisel, with a BMI of just 13.4.

Eliana Ramos

In 2007, the world saw devastating deaths of yet more models.  Eliana Ramos, the younger sister of Luisel Ramos, died at the age of 18 (six months after her sister) after collapsing at the home of her grandparents, caused from a heart attack relating to her eating disorder. Maiara Galvao Vieira, an aspiring Brazilian model, was only 14 years old when she died of complications relating to the disease. It was said that Maiara was just 38kgs at the time of her death.

Probably the most heart wrenching video I have seen for a live news story, was that of (Hila)Elmalich, an Israeli model who died at 34 years old on November 12^th 2007. Elmalich had been battling with her anorexic eating disorder for 21 years, from the age of 13 when she first began modelling. In the video below, Elmalich collapsed on Israeli TV and taken to hospital. At the time of her death she weighed only 22kgs. The man in the video is Adi Barkan, an Israeli fashion designer and modelling agent, also a friend of Elmalich’s. "When she fell down, I felt the bones going into my legs, like a knife. When she fell down, I felt like I took hold of something from the grave". From his own experience with working in the fashion industry, Barkan knows that models are under pressure to lose weight. "In Israel we lost several sizes in 10 years!" he said, "when I was shooting fashion 10 years ago models were size 38, now it's 32 or 34." From his experience with Elmalich, Adi has campaigned worldwide for healthier models.

Adi Barkan & (Hila) Elmalich

Yes the effects of being a size zero can be seriously dangerous, even proved to be fatal. With a weight and height that calculates to less than the recommended BMI of 18.5, the dangers and risk to your health become extremely serious. Being malnourished and underweight by doing things to lose weight rapidly, can result in liver, kidney and heart failure; cause infertility; insomnia; hair loss; electrolyte imbalances; dehydration; hyponatremia; muscle atrophy; paralysis; throat cancer; dental problems; weakness and fatigue; seizures; cause severe psychological problems, and the list goes on. With the use of diet pills for rapid weight loss, the effects may even cause incontinence, and nothing is attractive about not being able to control your bowel and bladder, just to fit into some teeny dolls clothes. The effects of being a size zero can be irreversible, destructible, and fatal.

To attain and even feel the desire to attain, such a (ridiculous) weight, is not only mind boggling after seeing the effects and hearing the stories, but it is actually quite saddening. How is it that these girls feel so immensely that they must starve for an image?