Why Women in Russia Are Selling Their Used Breast Implants Online
· Vice
Since Western sanctions reshaped the Russian economy, people have found creative ways to make ends meet. Listing used breast implants on classified ad sites is among the more recent strategies.
Classified ad platforms across Russia are seeing a surge in listings for secondhand breast implants—removed, boxed up, and priced to move. The BAZA Telegram channel first flagged the trend, reporting that high-end devices are now selling for three to four times below their original cost. Mentor implants that ran 140,000 rubles ($1,820) are listed at around 35,000 rubles ($455). Motiva implants originally priced at 200,000 rubles ($2,600) are going for 30,000 rubles ($390). The sellers, notably, aren’t clustered in economically depressed regions—a meaningful number of listings are coming out of Moscow and St. Petersburg.
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Russia Is Seriously Lacking Breast Implants
The backdrop matters here. All breast implants sold in Russia are imported, with the vast majority historically coming from the US and Germany—a supply chain that has been under pressure since Western sanctions hit following the invasion of Ukraine. The situation has been persistent enough that as recently as December 2025, Russia announced plans to launch its own domestic silicone implant production facility in Nizhny Novgorod, according to a report by Pravda France.
Breast augmentation surgeries have dropped about 40% over the last decade, per Oddity Central, and the combination of disrupted supply, inflated costs, and declining purchasing power appears to be what’s driving women to recoup whatever they can from the procedure they’re undoing.
The buyers, if any exist, are getting a bad deal that they may not even realize. No reputable surgeon will work with a used silicone implant. After removal, they retain biomaterial from the original owner, and proper sterilization isn’t possible—the material can’t be boiled and doesn’t respond to formalin. Medical experts have flagged serious risks: immune rejection, tissue necrosis, and, in worst-case scenarios, death. The implants are being purchased, essentially, by people who either don’t know that or are buying them as novelty items, which is a whole different topic.
For context on just how strange this situation has gotten: when sanctions first disrupted the implant supply chain, a Russian plastic surgeon named Evgeny Dobreikin proposed a solution: “RosGrud”—or “Russian Breasts”—implants produced domestically in the colors of the Russian flag or military fatigues. One of his clients described it as “my way of defending my homeland.” That project appears to have gone nowhere. The secondhand market filled the gap instead.
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