Stem cell pills claiming to make customers "feel and look at least seven years younger" can be bought through Filipino websites for just 9,000 pesos (US$200).

Carrion-Norton, 66, a member of the Philippine Olympic Committee and a former undersecretary for medical tourism, credits her vitality to adult stem cell therapy.

The day I got the therapy I went to a dinner party and everyone told me: Cynthia, youre blooming!, Carrion-Norton told AFP.

The procedure involves harvesting the patients stem cells from their own fat and injecting them into their blood, which she likened to being injected with intravenous fluid in the arm.

In a country where many elite are obsessed with anti-ageing, wealthy Filipinos are shelling out between US$12,500 and US$18,000 per session of stem cell therapy in the belief it will improve their overall health and make them look younger.

Rich businessmen and public officials mostly male are the most eager customers, according to Florencio Lucero, a doctor in Manila who said he started performing adult stem cell therapy in 2006.

They do it because they want to work longer, Lucero told AFP.

And then they tell their wives or girlfriends.

Lucero said Filipinos had been receiving anti-ageing stem cell treatment since the 1970s, often flying abroad to do so.

Thai medical entrepreneur Bobby Kittichaiwong says he has a lucrative business catering to the Filipino elite, who pay US$20,000 to visit his Villa Medica clinic in Germany for a more controversial form of stem cell therapy.

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Philippine elite fight ageing with stem cell therapy