Campaign group Bureau Clara Wichmann is planning to take legal action against US pharmaceuticals company Allergan in an effort to get it to pay for the removal of its breast implants from Dutch women because of the cancer risk.

At least 52 women in the Netherlands have developed a form of lymphoma from implants – and 70% of those cases involve Allergan products.

The group and patient organisation SVS are calling on women to come forward to join the legal action. Some 60,000 women in the Netherlands are thought to still have the Allergan implants which were sold under the name Biocell but have since been removed from the Dutch market.

‘The consequences are terrible for the women who developed lymphoma but the tens of thousands of women with these implants are still living in uncertainty, shame, pain and fear,’ said Marga van Amersfoort, SVS chairwoman.

‘It is also expensive to remove the implants and reconstruct the breasts, something which women now largely pay for themselves.’

Allergan began a recall of the implants in 2019 after being asked to do so by the FDA. The company is best known as the maker of botox.