‘Making too much money’: Inside Miami-Dade’s plastic surgery post-op underground

Miami — ground zero in the United States for the Brazilian butt lift, the mommy makeover, breast enlargement and other plastic surgery specialties — has achieved another distinction: It is home to a cottage industry of illegally operating recovery centers for post-op patients who need to hunker down and heal, sometimes for days.

Embedded in suburbia, the homes are engaged in a game of whack-a-mole with authorities, who look for vans disgorging bruised and bandaged passengers, and featuring back-alley garbage cans brimming with bandages and other medical waste.

Often overcrowded and/or unsanitary, these unlicensed centers are “costing Miami-Dade County millions,” said Detective Gabriel Rodriguez, who has overseen a string of recent busts.

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