- Alicia Williams, a ninth grade English teacher at Huffman High School in Birmingham, Alabama, died on June 7.
- The 45-year-old woman had gone town to the Dominican Republic on to have an undisclosed cosmetic procedure on June 2.
- Family members told WBRC that Williams suffered complications, including blood clots, after the procedure, and died.
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An Alabama high school teacher died in the Dominican Republic after facing complications from a cosmetic procedure she received while in the country.
Alicia Williams, a ninth grade English teacher at Huffman High School in Birmingham, Alabama, died on June 7, family members told WBRC.
Williams, 45, had gone down to the Dominican on to have an undisclosed cosmetic procedure on June 2. After the procedure, she suffered complications, including blood clots.
It remains unclear where the procedure was performed.
The Dominican Republic was named the place a US tourist is most likely to incur complications from plastic surgery, according to a report from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston published earlier this year.
In 2016, US health officials issued a warning about "medical tourism" after at least 18 women were infected by disfiguring bacteria after undergoing plastic surgery procedures in the Dominican Republic.
The infections, caused by a germ called mycobacteria, led to women being hospitalized and forced to take antibiotics for months, the CDC said at the time, according to CBS News.
Williams' family friend, Georgia-based plastic surgeon Myla Bennett, told KRON 4 that the Dominican Republic can be a dangerous place to get plastic surgery done.
"The thing about the Dominican Republic that is a little different than Miami and Columbia and Tawana and some of the other places where bad things tend to happen, is that even the women who don't die, a lot of women come back and get really horrific infections that are difficult to clear," Bennett said.
Williams' sister has organized a Facebook fundraiser in hopes of bringing back her sister's body from the island nation, and raise money for Williams' 14-year-old son.
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