Editor’s Note: Shirley Lord has been at the front seat of the beauty business for years. Born in London, she was working in Fleet Street at the age of 18 and became woman’s editor of three leading London evening newspapers. In the early 70s she moved to the United States to become beauty editor of Harper’s Bazaar, moving in 1980 to American Vogue to become beauty and health director and where she has had a long and distinguished career. She is the author of five novels, and has also written two "Bibles" on health and beauty, and an autobiography.

On Memorial Day, of all days, just as I was about to slip off my slingbacks, going "barefoot in the park" was given a thorough drubbing in The New York Times, with ominous warnings of lurking parasites in the grass and dangerous bacteria everywhere to infect naked soles and toes. It was a catch-22 start to summer for many foot docs, who look to the sunny barefoot season as a reprieve for feet otherwise shod in fashionable shoes that grow unsteadily taller and taller, and less and less substantial with — surprise, surprise — women increasingly crazy to wear them. (There is still a l-o-n-g waiting list for the latest Louis Vuitton five-inch-heeled disco sandal.)

Click here to see some of this summer’s sexiest — and scariest — shoes.

As far as the majority of experts are concerned, "crazy" is the operative word. Dr. Richard Kushner, a leading New York podiatrist, puts it bluntly. "Twenty-five percent of the bones in the body are in the feet. When you wear these bone breakers, you are essentially walking only on the ends of the metatarsals. Not even a ballerina would do that for long. The amount of time you spend ‘toe walking’ is all important. Too long and too often means repetitive trauma, which will cause permanent osteoarthritic changes. And there’s no age limit. Permanent damage can happen at any age. It all depends on the duration of the assault.

"If you must wear very high heels, plan to stand for only 30 to 40 minutes maximum, then you may be able to avoid trouble."

Today, however, to the concern of the American Podiatric Medical Association, more and more ardent fashionistas are making the problem worse by turning to elective foot surgery. Not only do they seek to remove bunions, but to shorten, straighten and even realign toes that inconveniently get in the way of being seriously stylish around the clock without pain, not to mention the risk of a twisted ankle or two.

A New York Times medical article exposed some podiatrists, who advocate these elective procedures (and have press agents to prove it). "Critics do not understand that when doctors tell their patients not to wear high heels, patients do so anyway," a doctor was quoted as saying. "’People say, why do toe surgery if they work just fine? Well, why do a nose job when your nose is working just fine.’ It’s the same thing. People want to look their best.’"

Dr. Rock Positano, director of the nonoperative foot and ankle service at the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan had an immediate response: "’You don’t walk on your face. The foot is a complex network that must support more than 100 thousand pounds of pressure for every mile walked.’"

"Women don’t realize that by tampering with the anatomy of the feet they are changing the mechanics of how they work," says Taryn Rose, a qualified orthopedic surgeon, who a few years ago, after long dealing with patients with serious foot problems, caused by too much dedication to fashion, decided to design shoes herself that were as wearable as they were fashionable.