Just when we’d gotten used to smearing animal placenta on our faces, along comes TNS, a cream made from – brace yourself – baby foreskin. Jars of the stuff are flying off the shelves at plastic surgeons’ and dermatologists’ offices.
What does it (ostensibly) do? Tissue, cloned from a foreskin, has been made into a gel containing human-growth factors, which are said to stimulate collagen growth and elasticity. The cream “smells a little funky, but that goes away within seconds, and the skin feels firm and tighter,” testifies Michele Sabino, an aesthetician who works with Manhattan plastic surgeons Gerald Imber and Robert Silich. A month’s supply costs $130.
“Everybody wants to have skin like a baby,” says Amy Colton, who markets the elixir. And as the only easily available baby skin, foreskin was an obvious source. But have no fear about a black market. “It’s not from many little penises. Only one was cloned,” explains Sabino.