Hong Kong's Life of Life Healing Spa is increasingly getting more customers as it offers to reduce 15 centimeters of fat after the very first session. Owner Karen Chu claims that around 100 customers have undergone the treatment with a good degree of success since the spa first began offering the 'Aqua-Fire' treatment when they opened in August. The fire treatment given here has not yet resulted in any injuries. Most people from the West are scared of going through the treatment, while more and more Asians flock towards the spa. Sources from the spa also claim that the fire treatment also boosts the immune system, relieves stress, deep cleanses the skin and eases muscular aches and pains and stomach problems.

The initial treatment which is priced at $135 produces immediate results, though a series of five or 20 treatments at a cost of up to $2,500 a package produced better results. The idea of heat as a healing treatment is not new to either Chinese or Western medicine. In the slimming industry it is used as body wraps or applied in the form of hot mud and even chocolate.

But never before has the source of the heat actually been fire - one of the five natural elements on which traditional Chinese medicine is based. The treatment, which lasts for about 90 minutes, begins with a body scrub and a spa bath, followed by a painful massage in which the fatty area is pummeled and kneaded like bread dough. Next the skin is basted with a thin mud-like solution - a concoction of Chinese medicinal herbs.