What are some of the craziest things a woman can do for the sake of beauty?

For some women in China, they are putting tiny pegs into their nostrils to make them look sharper and pointier.

According to The Daily Mail, the beauty trend apparently started in South Korea around two years ago, and has since spread to Japan, mainland China and Taiwan, where women with a pointier Westerner-looking nose are considered more attractive.

Here are some before and after pictures.

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"Magical" nose-lifting device

The non-surgical nose-lifting trend involves a set of tools which can be bought easily on shopping websites in China. Most cost just around 30RMB (SGD$6), according to popular shopping website Taobao.

A typical set consists of two small curved pegs, each measuring two to three centimetres long depending on its size, as well as one adjusting hook, as shown below.

According to the instructions online, users should first insert the two pegs into their nostrils before using the hook to adjust the pegs so they stand at a 45-degree angle inside the nose.

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Health hazard

According to Apple Daily, a 25-year-old woman in Taipei nearly lost her nose last November after a peg poked through her nasal membrane and caused a bacterial infection.

There has been a rise in women under the age of 30 seeking medical help after using the device for a prolonged period of time. In Taiwan, it is not uncommon for doctors to encounter such a patient on a weekly basis.

Also, another woman in Chongqing, China, had somehow accidentally inhaled a peg while trying to remove the trapped foreign object from her nose. Doctors eventually found it in her stomach and removed it from her body two days later.

Doctors have advised that the pegs should not be left in the nostrils for more than three hours when they are used.

Though some doctors have gone to the extent of calling the beauty trend 'life-threatening', and advised women not to use the nasal pegs as tiny objects could block a person's respiratory tract, causing breathing difficulties and even posing a danger to life.